


The Course Of A Year

by Lyrecho



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Akira's Spiralling Internal Monologue, Feelings, Fluff and Angst, Found Family, Hopeful Ending, Intrigue, M/M, Non-Chronological, Persona 3 References, Post-Game(s), Shadow Operatives, Shiho Suzui Is A Phantom Thief, Shukita Big Bang, Snark, Team as Family, Yusuke's Outward Chill™, headcanons, semi canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 15:06:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13413828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyrecho/pseuds/Lyrecho
Summary: He was the leader of the Phantom Thieves. He was Joker, the ace up their team's sleeve, and he had what felt like all of the eyes in Tokyo directly on him. If he could stay cool and clear headed with all of that weighing him down, than any crush shouldn't so much as phase him. He should be able to be way more suave about this.But when Yusuke came into the picture, cool collection was a thing of the past and 'suave' was a laughably distant dream.Growing up and growing together, all over the course of a year.|Tumblr||Twitter|





	The Course Of A Year

**Author's Note:**

> This is my contribution to the Shukita Big Bang!!! It was a lot of fun to work on this fic over the past few months, and I hope you'll enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it <3
> 
> I also had three amazing artists assigned to be my partners!!!
> 
>  
> 
> [Shao (4nimenut)](https://4nimenut.tumblr.com)  
> [duel-echo](https://duel-echo.tumblr.com)  
> [ToonSyche](https://toonsyche.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> They've all done amazing work so please check them out once they've posted!!!

**|now|**

The sound of spring in Shinokawa was different to the sound of it in Tokyo. The incessant chirping of birds and tree leaves rustling in the warm air was familiar to Akira – a chorus he had known his whole life up until his probation, having never really left his hometown for any length of time before that – but after a year spent in the city, he almost missed the sound of it; the traffic, the people, the chink of porcelain and cutlery coming from the café below him.

He sighed, and pushed his shoulder harder into the wall he leant against, his legs curled up beneath him on the rumpled sheets of his bed; he’d sat right by his completely open window in the hope of getting some fresh air on his skin and circulating his room – even though it was not yet summer, spring in Shinokawa was always so _stuffy_ , humid and clinging in comparison to the dry heat of the city.

His door creaked open, and Akira lazily let his gaze drift to Morgana, who collapsed on the floor rather than expend effort trying to claw his way up to the mattress. Akira didn’t envy him - a fur coat must have felt horrible right about now.

“What is it?” He asked. Hot air rises, after all - if Morgana had left the cold of the tiled, downstairs kitchen for the hot, stale torture that was Akira’s bedroom, than there had to have been a reason for it. _He_ didn’t even really want to be in his room - but his self-imposed exile was better than the stiff, polite awkwardness of being around his parents after a year away; a year of coming to think of a different place as ‘home’ and different people as ‘family.’

“Your mother is on the warpath,” Morgana said quietly. “She woke up with her hip aching, and this heat isn’t making her mood any better.”

Akira squeezed his eyes shut, and let out a hissing breath through clenched teeth. “Is she upset at me, or at my dad?”

“I think just in general; she’s prowling for a target to let loose on.” Two slow, luminous cat blinks, and Akira wondered if Morgana was ever consciously aware of what his tail was doing as it flicked away a fly that buzzed too close. “Maybe you should get out of the house for a while.”

Akira grimaced, and resettled in a new position against his wall - hot skin sticking uncomfortably with sweat to his shirt. Shinokawa was a small town, after all - and, cleared of all charges or not, a year earlier he had irrevocably gone from ‘that quiet Kurusu boy’ to ‘violent delinquent just waiting to lash out.’ Home was awkward, and quiet, but at least his parents understood he’d never done anything wrong - their uncertainty around him came from the fact that they’d sent their son away on the court's orders and had a stranger returned to them. They just...weren’t sure of how to react to this new Akira, or get to know him at all.

But the people around town - they were different. They _stared_. They whispered, like they thought he wouldn’t hear them, or as if they didn’t care. Say what you would about the city, at least there he didn’t have to worry about a cashier refusing to serve him because they knew on sight he had a criminal record. And having to deal with that kind of treatment in his hometown, from the people he used to call ‘friends’ and the old grandmother whose lawn he used to mow...it _hurt_ , in a way Akira wasn’t entirely sure he was ready to admit, not even to himself.

If there was one thing he wanted to do even less than go out and be stared at, though, it was be a bother to his mother. He’d already caused enough trouble for his parents - the entire reason he’d been blessed enough to serve his year of probation under Sojiro rather than in juvenile detention was because of the favours his father had called in from his fellow lawyer buddies (Akira was still quietly convinced that Sae Nijima may have had something to do with his enrolment in Shujin, even if he’d never said so aloud and she had never confirmed a single thing) and he _knew_ that had made the past year difficult for them. It had to have.

For an absence of anything _real_ to do, and feeling Morgana’s eyes still lingering on him (his parents had been surprised that he’d brought a cat home as a souvenir, but hadn’t put up any protest to the idea of keeping him, thankfully), Akira reached for his phone and thumbed it to life. The screen lit up red and black, his theme unchanged since his arrival in Tokyo, and he sighed as he registered no new or unread messages.

It made sense, he supposed. It was break for the others in Tokyo, too, and they probably had their own things to do. They couldn’t be hovering around their phones all the time, waiting for Akira to contact them.

Still…he bit at his lip, and his thumb hovered over Yusuke’s name in his contact list. He’d kept in touch with his friends back in the city, of course – and Yusuke, staying alone in a cheap apartment while the dorms were closed over the summer, was one of his most frequent contacts. Ann’s schedule was unpredictable, filled with modelling shoots; Makoto and Haru were both preparing to enter university – Todai, he knew, and was proud of them. Ryuji was working on getting himself ready for his third year of high school and helping his mum out around the house – his calls and texts usually came either at lunch or evening.

The only person back home – Tokyo, back in _Tokyo_ – who he talked to more than Yusuke was Futaba (and Sojiro, by default). She was pretty much always online, after all – but a quick switch between apps showed a greyed out name by her chat icon; she was either AFK or incognito and didn’t want to talk. Akira couldn’t blame her – with all the confidence she’d gained over the course of the past few months, Sojiro was determined to get her back in an actual school for her second year. They all knew she was probably already smart enough to join Haru and Makoto at Todai, but this was more about getting out with kids her own age.

Akira had figured she’d apply for Shujin, but she’d yet to actually commit to what school she was aiming for. He knew Yusuke had jokingly suggested Futaba joining him at Kosei, and wondered how seriously Futaba had taken that offer.

…and his thoughts were spiralling again. They always did, it seemed, when it came to Yusuke. They hadn’t really talked of anything too _serious_ since. Well. Christmas, Akira supposed – even Valentine’s Day had been as light hearted as they could force it to be, and the short road trip they’d taken in that first week of the break as they took the longest route possible to Shinokawa had been a hazy, surreal paradise of absolutely zero real world problems.

Akira couldn’t even blame Yusuke for his reticence – not after how everything between them had reached a crescendo on December 24th that had crashed down the very next day. Not his fault, not anyone’s fault…just inevitable bad luck.

“If you’re going to call him, just do it.”

Akira blinked at Morgana. “What?”

“You’ve been frowning at that phone for nearly ten minutes. You’ve got your Yusuke face on, so it wasn’t hard to figure out why.”

“My – what?” Akira stared at the cat stretched out across his floor, undeniably smug with the careless grace only a cat could exude while lying completely still. “ _What?_ ”

Morgana stared back at him, gaze distinctly unimpressed. “Your Yusuke face,” he repeated. “That dreamy, love struck look of constipation.”

“You’re lucky I’m literally too hot to be bothered to move right now,” Akira said. “If it was even two degrees cooler, I’d be smothering you with a pillow.”

“You could _try_ ,” Morgana muttered. “And don’t think I didn’t notice you _not_ denying the existence of the Yusuke face!”

“Why would I?” Akira muttered, and flopped down against his mattress, kicking his blankets to the floor with a huff. “I deny that my face looks as stupid as you claim, though.”

Morgana blinked. “ _Huh_ ,” he said. “I was totally convinced you were so blind you had no idea you were totally in love with him.”

Akira scowled vaguely in Morgana’s direction, but kept his mouth shut on the comment that wanted to escape - that when it came down to it, it was the _rest_ of them that were blind, because he and Yusuke had both been aware of the other’s feelings for quite some time.

They’d shared a confession on Christmas Eve, after all.

Never mind the fact that Akira’s following months in prison and then his move back home, away from the city had simply complicated things to the point that neither of them were really sure of what they were doing, or their future together - at that one point, they’d cleared the air between them by just confessing everything. They _knew_ how the other felt - and those feelings hadn’t changed - just their circumstances had.

Akira sighed, letting a breath out through clenched teeth. “Maybe you’re right,” he admitted, glancing around his room – as stuffy and crowded as his thoughts. “Maybe I _do_ need to go get some fresh air.”

Morgana all but preened. “Of course I’m right,” he said. “I’m _always_ right.”

He shook his head disbelievingly, a smile tugging at his lips despite himself. “Right,” he began, before cutting himself off as his phone buzzed in his hand. He glanced down to see a new private message blinking an alert at him – from Shiho Suzui, her name lit up pink, with a green ‘online’ circle right by it.

> **SS:** Akira-kun, are you free today?

Akira blinked, and let the smile come out for real. Somehow, Shiho’s message had come just when he needed it; he’d been quietly sad when the girl who was Ann’s greatest friend had moved away towards the beginning of his year in Tokyo – mostly because it had made _Ann_ sad, but also because Shiho had been one of the few people to actually be kind to him without knowing him, simply because that was just the kind of person that she was: kind. That he’d never had the chance to truly get to know her had been somewhat of a disappointment, though he had been glad that she was going to get the chance to find her own happiness.

So when he’d learned that the small town she had transferred to, just outside of Tokyo, had pretty much been next door to his own hometown, he – and Ann and Shiho both – had jumped on the chance to have them meet, for real. Ann, because she was worried that both her friends were lonely and wanted them to be friends with each other (also probably so they could report to her on the other, because Akira _knew_ that if Ann was asking him for Shiho Updates, she was also totally asking Shiho for Akira Updates); Shiho, because she wanted to keep Ann happy and also because she wanted to get to know Akira better.

And Akira…because he hadn’t wanted to spend his entire spring break alone.

> **AK:** as free as a bird.
> 
> **SS:** a jailbird
> 
> **AK:** don’t sass me like that shiho
> 
> **AK:** i did my time.

Akira snorted when Shiho’s next response didn’t come as swiftly as the rest – both she and Ann were frighteningly fast typers with fingers of pure speed and lightning. She _was_ clearly still speaking to him – proved by the three small dots jumping around her chat box on his screen – but if it was taking her this long to get to her point, then he could only assume she was writing an _essay_.

“Are you talking to Shiho?” Morgana’s voice was curious, and Akira peered up from his phone screen to see his cat rolling around on his floor, twisting on his back. “Why are you texting her? Go talk to her in person!”

Akira’s phone buzzed once more in his hand before he could so much as think of a reply, and he automatically dismissed Morgana with a roll of his eyes as he turned his attention back to his conversation with Shiho.

> **SS:** sure you did, Akira-kun.
> 
> **SS:** Anyway, are you free today? I have something I want to talk to you about in person.
> 
> **SS:** Ann is here too!
> 
> **SS:** I mean, not in person.
> 
> **SS:** We’re Skyping.
> 
> **AK:** Skype is dead, Shiho
> 
> **SS:** Don’t shame me like this Akira-kun.
> 
> **AK:** I’m calling you out.
> 
> **AK:** Callout post for Shiho Suzui:
> 
> **AK:** uses proper grammar in her texts
> 
> **AK:** uses honorifics in her texts
> 
> **AK:** uses Skype
> 
> **AK:** is a cutie pie
> 
> **SS:** Akira-kun, oh my god.
> 
> **SS:** Ann is laughing now.
> 
> **AK:** at me or you?
> 
> **SS:** At both of us, I think.
> 
> **AK:** that sounds like Ann
> 
> **AK:** so where do you want to meet up?
> 
> **SS:** That internet cafe in your town, maybe?
> 
> **AK:** I don’t mind coming over to yours
> 
> **AK:** If you don’t want to come all the way over to shinokawa, I mean
> 
> **SS:** I don’t mind at all, Akira-kun!
> 
> **AK:** well if you’re sure
> 
> **SS:** I am! I’ll get on the next bus and see you in about an hour  >:3c
> 
> **AK:** how dare you
> 
> **AK:** don’t make that face at me
> 
> **SS:** >:3c >:3c >:3c
> 
> **AK:** you’re a monster

Shiho’s icon faded out in the chat, her lit up name becoming grey, and Akira could just hear her laughing at him in the back of his mind. He was smiling himself – the corners of his lips tugging up just the slightest bit.

Most people wouldn’t have been able to read his expression honestly – his face just wasn’t one that offered itself to emoting well – but Morgana wasn’t most people, wasn’t even ‘most’ of his friends.

“You look happy,” he said, eyes shrewd and somewhat smug.

“And you look like a cat,” Akira shot back. “Catch yourself a canary?”

“Something better, maybe,” Morgana said. “You’re smiling, Akira.”

He blinked. “Yeah, I know,” he said. “Your point?”

“You haven’t smiled much, not since you came home. Or…” he trailed off, and narrowed his eyes. “Maybe I should say, since _leaving_ home for Shinokawa.”

Embarrassed despite himself, for reasons he couldn’t quite put a finger on or name to, Akira fidgeted on his bed, feeling his face heat up. He cursed the pale skin he’d inherited from his mother for showing his blush so easily when Morgana grinned.

“I’m not judging you,” Morgana said. “Or telling you off, or anything like that. I’m just happy that _you_ seem to finally be happy.” He paused, and tilted his head. “But you feel guilty, don’t you? Why?”

Akira sighed. “Because Leblanc isn’t home, not really,” he said. “Shinokawa isn’t, either, but – my parents had as much choice as I did in my being sent away. It’s not their fault, it’s not anyone’s fault but Shido’s, but being here is _awkward_ now. And…I can’t help but feel a little resentment that they didn’t fight to keep me here with them harder, though I _know_ that my dad had to pull a lot of strings to get me placed with a civilian for my probation.”

“It’s okay to feel resentment, I think,” Morgana said. “Just like it’s fine for you to feel guilty, too. I think I’d be more worried if you _didn’t_ feel like that – almost like you were lying to yourself.”

Akira chuckled. “I can’t lie to myself,” he said, and felt the whispers of Satanael’s presence brush up against the forefront of his mind, a sibilant reminder that, even if the Metaverse was gone, his personas were still with him. “I’ve seen what self-delusion can do to a person, and I refuse to fall into a self-made labyrinth like that.”

“Wise words,” Morgana said. “I’d expect nothing less from you, _Joker_.” He grinned. “But you know, the first step away from that path is letting yourself be happy?”

Akira rolled his eyes. “I get it, I get it,” he said. “‘Stop holing yourself up in this room and go get some socialization and sun,’ am I right?”

Morgana laughed, but his gaze was serious. “You should know better than anyone the importance of strengthening your bonds,” he said. “And of keeping them strong once you’ve made them.”

Halfway through pushing himself off of his bed, Akira paused. The truth was, since the Metaverse had fallen, he’d rarely thought of his friends as the ‘bonds’ they’d once been referred to by the residents of the Velvet Room. Briefly, looking at his cat, he wondered if Morgana had visited that Room since what had happened over Christmas. He’d been living on the streets – he’d said that, and Akira had no reason to disbelieve him (he’d been mangy enough that he pretty much couldn’t, anyway) – which Akira couldn’t imagine he’d have done if he’d had access to the Velvet Room. But – since then, since coming to Shinokawa, even – Morgana hadn’t spent every moment of every day by Akira’s side. If he was able to reach the Velvet Room at all, then it happening during that time frame wasn’t too out of the realm of possibility.

“Is Shiho a bond, then?” He asked. “I never did find out what, exactly, entailed one.”

Morgana flicked his tail in his approximation of a shrug. “She had the potential, sure,” he said. “But your contract with the Velvet Room is over. She’s a bond – and one of power – but…in the more traditional sense, now.” A smile. “Akira, she’s your friend.”

The smile was back on his face, larger this time, and he ducked his head as he felt his blush flare back to life. “I know that,” he mumbled. “And she’ll be waiting to meet me soon, so stop distracting me.”

Morgana rolled his eyes. “Well, at least you’re not moping over Yusuke anymore,” he said. “Have fun, Akira.”

Fond, Akira crouched down to run a hand over Morgana’s back, pausing once he reached his head to rub around his ears. Where his friend would have once batted his hand away or protested, he leaned into his touch with a near inaudible purr. “I will,” Akira promised, and stood to leave.

Morgana made no move to follow him, and he had the sneaking suspicion that the cat was going to curl up on his pillows the moment he’d left the house proper. Keeping in mind Morgana’s warning about his mother’s mood, Akira crept carefully down the stairs, keeping his tread light and balancing his weight onto the very edge of the steps, where they were the most solid and didn’t creak. It was a routine and a path he’d learned off by heart from years of going to the kitchen for breakfast on weekends without waking up his parents, and he practically flew down to the first floor, barely even needing to think about where he was placing his feet.

Even though the whole point of him stealthing his way down the stairs was to avoid drawing the ire of his mother, Akira still made sure to hunt her down and inform her he was going out with friends for a few hours – since his arrest, his mother had gained (a somewhat veritable amount of) paranoia about his location at any given time, like she was scared that he’d leave her sight and then vanish altogether. The fact that this worry had put him under what was pretty much a house arrest was frustrating – but, at the same time, he couldn’t completely blame her. He was, after all, still being watched in at least some capacity – the car that had tried to tail them home on their road trip at the beginning of the break had just proved that.

(He just wasn’t sure _who_ was watching him. The government? Some leftover remnants of Shido’s conspiracy? Some completely unknown third party? They hadn’t been able to figure it out, not even with Futaba’s hacking or Sae Nijima subtly prodding her way through files she almost definitely had no right to be accessing. In the end, they’d all just sort of collectively shrugged, because they knew that the only way they’d be figuring anything out would be for the other side to make a move.)

“Akira?” His mother blinked at him as he ducked into her room, placed on the first floor so she didn’t have to climb up the stairs every time she wanted to lie down. She spoke in perfect Japanese, but her voice still carried the British accent she’d had since birth, and even though he’d been home for a while now, after a year of hearing nothing but Tokyo accents hearing her speak sometimes threw him for a loop. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Yeah, I’m going to go meet up with some friends at a café in town,” he said, carefully not mentioning that it was friend, singular, and their shared long distance buddy meeting up over a video call. “That’s cool, right?”

His mother’s smile was soft. “You’re nearly an adult, Akira,” she said. “You don’t need my permission to leave the house. But thank you, for coming to tell me.” She looked down at the book she still held open on her lap. “Please be home before dark, okay?”

There was a plea in her eyes, and Akira wondered if maybe he wasn’t the only one still having the occasional nightmare about his arrest. “I will,” he said. “I promise.”

**|then|**

“I promise you,” Akira said, in a tone filled with barely suppressed humour, his withheld laughter making his voice tight, “that you will live just long enough to regret this.”

Futaba’s smirk said she wasn’t buying his (completely, utterly serious) threat at all, but it was Yusuke’s laughter, low and quiet, echoing throughout Leblanc’s attic, that had his attention – even as it caused said smirk to fade into a slight pout.

"I'm fairly certain that Akira has suffered enough," he said. "If you tickle him anymore, that might just be the end of our leader, Futaba. And we can't have that."

“What’s Inari even doing here?” Futaba asked Akira, turning her back to Yusuke with a flourish. “I thought today was a Me Day. I was going to introduce you to Touhou.”

 _Lovely_ , Akira thought. “Yusuke texted me earlier,” he said. “He was hungry.” The reasoning was pretty much self-explanatory beyond that, and Futaba swiftly deflated. Even if she’d been planning to spend the summer afternoon alone with Akira, she – like the rest of them – was a firm and loyal member of the Fatten Yusuke Up group. She wasn’t going to get between him and food, even if she was currently rolling her eyes over it.

“If Sojiro’s making him curry, I better get some too,” she muttered, and then shoved her bag into Akira’s chest, like a minute ago she hadn’t been trying (and somewhat succeeding) to tickle him to death. “Here, get the games set up while I go bug him for food.”

Akira blinked, and then she was already moving for the stairs. “Wait, Futaba – Futaba – and she’s gone,” he said, and frowned down at the bag he now held. After a moment of silent consideration, he tossed it to the side with a shrug.

Yusuke’s gaze tracked it as it fell to his bed. “Was that wise?” He asked, and there was amusement sparkling in his eyes. “If you broke one of her games, I’m fairly certain there will be a fate worse than death awaiting you.”

“Yeah, she’ll get Sojiro to stop feeding me curry,” Akira laughed. “But I don’t think we have to worry about me breaking anything; I don’t know much about Touhou beyond cute girls and bullet hell, but I’m pretty sure they’re PC only, and if there’s one thing I know about Futaba and computers…” He trailed off, but a nod from Yusuke showed that he had gotten the message.

“She builds her own, correct? And, I imagine, builds them to survive anything short of the apocalypse.”

“Don’t insult Futaba’s work like that, Yusuke. I’m sure her computers are strong enough that whenever the apocalypse comes, they’ll be chilling with the cockroaches.”

Yusuke inclined his head. “I’m not certain of the validity of that statement, but I did not mean to insult Futaba’s computers. Though she may use a different medium of expression than I, she, too, is an incredible artist, and to belittle her skills or results would be incredibly demeaning of me.”

Akira blinked – Yusuke’s words were serious, completely heartfelt, as everything he did and said was (he was like, ninety nine percent sure that Yusuke didn’t know how to be sarcastic, let alone malicious) – and then smiled, because it was just so _Yusuke_.

“Why are you smiling at me like that?”

“No reason,” he laughed. “Just happy you’re you, you know?”

The brief confusion that flickered across Yusuke’s face told Akira that actually, he might not know, but he was so cute when he tilted his head like that that he forgave him.

“Thank you,” Yusuke said, though he didn’t look as though he truly understood what he was thanking Akira for. He nodded at the bag Akira had tossed to the side. “Are you not going to set that up like Futaba asked?”

Akira shrugged. “I’m not messing with her tech,” he said. “Even if I did, she’d totally redo once she got back up here to make sure I did it _right_.”

“Well, maybe this is a test,” Yusuke said, and there was a distinct level of bemused teasing clear in his tone that had Akira narrowing his eyes. “Let us work together to see if we can solve the inner workings of Futaba’s computer.” As he said this, he stood, and though his words had clearly been prodded to make light-hearted fun of Akira, genuine determination burned in his eyes.

Akira was reaching for the bag and pulling out the contents before his brain could catch up to what his body was doing. Forget puppy eyes, _that_ look was his weakness.

He almost scowled at how his own body betrayed him, but then Yusuke smiled at him as he settled on the bed beside him, and his mind was reduced to a mess of frenzied, nonsense babbling and gibberish.

He didn't understand how a simple _crush_ could bring him down like this. He'd had crushes before, and he'd known from the moment he'd seen Yusuke - when they'd thought he was maybe a stalker, and he'd had to fight valiantly to stop himself from blushing over the guy harassing his friend - but he'd never been as completely taken over by one before as he was _this_ one. He wasn't sure if it was because it was Yusuke, or if it was because of the mystical arcana bond they shared that, at times, _literally_ chained them together, or if it was because awakening Arsene all those months ago had just brought him closer to being his own self than he ever had before - but it was as annoying and. And _mortifying_. Almost as much as it was awe-inspiring.

He was the leader of the Phantom Thieves. He was _Joker_ , the ace up their team's sleeve, and he had what felt like all of the eyes in Tokyo directly on him. If he could stay cool and clear headed with all of that weighing him down, than any crush shouldn't so much as phase him. He should be able to be _way_ more suave about this.

But when Yusuke came into the picture, cool collection was a thing of the past and 'suave' was a laughably distant dream.

"Uh," he said, realizing Yusuke was watching him space out with no small amount of amusement in his eyes, his head cocked at that one specific angle that meant he was taking in every feature of Akira as he was in that moment and translating it into some artwork in his mind that could only have come _from_ his mind. "Uh - we can get this set up on my desk?" He blindly handed Yusuke the first item from the bag he laid his hands on: a twisted tangle of cords and wires.

Yusuke frowned, biting at his bottom lip - a tic that Akira had in no way noticed he had within hours of him awakening to Goemon and then spent several months obsessing over; no way, no how - and even though he was already sitting down, Akira's knees suddenly felt incredibly weak. His palms started sweating as Yusuke dutifully stood and made his way over to the desk, painstakingly, carefully, starting the process of untangling the wires with precise, delicate touches.

 _Maybe you should just confess,_ he thought sourly, suddenly glad that Morgana was nowhere to be seen - he wasn't sure just where it was that his cat friend had disappeared to, but the moment he'd found out that Akira was planning to spend the day with Futaba, he'd scarpered like the Reaper was on his tail - if he'd been there, he'd be sending Akira a series of prompting looks that would be a mix of smugly knowing and exasperated, and that might have just sent any little bit of comprehension and dignity he could still lay claim to right over the edge. _Maybe if you weren't bottling this all up, and it was just out in the open, you wouldn't always be such a mess around him. So distracted, so embarrassed, so_ useless.

Akira scowled, and turned his attention to his own task - whatever that was. There were a bunch of hard drives - more than he could fathom Futaba possibly needing to show him a few games in one day, which admittedly sort of scared him - and he absentmindedly started stacking them together, while his mind turned over the agonizing possibility of doing what he'd just thought, and just straight up confessing to Yusuke that he had feelings for him.

His reluctance to do so - it didn't come from the fact that he was shy, per se (far from it), or even from some vaguely conscious fear of being rejected.

No - the fear came from something far more solid, more realistic, and inevitably looming than any of those outcomes.

The fact of the matter was, he was only in Tokyo for a year. As much as Leblanc had become a home to him - as much as _his_ attic felt like a warm and cozy space removed from time and worries, especially on a hazy summer day spent with two of the people most important to him in the entire world - it _wasn't_ his home. It just wasn't, and in the end, it never would be.

Because this would end. Come the end of his probation year, it _would_ end. There was nothing he could do about that fact. Nothing anyone could do - it was the order of the courts, and if there was one thing Akira had learnt, it's that the court was always obeyed. He couldn't fight against them. No one could. A cold, uncaring fact of life.

So, confessing - no matter the outcome - would just end in more pain for the both of them. Knowing that, there was no point - because while Akira was fine with some parts of living in Tokyo being fleeting, ephemeral...a romantic relationship was _not_ one of them. If he was going into a relationship, it would be with the mindset of trying as hard as he could to make it last - which couldn't exist if both parties already knew that it was inevitably destined to end.

"Here." Yusuke's voice broke him out of his spiralling thoughts, and he jumped, knocking the hard drives he'd been fidgeting with over as he looked up, blinking, to see Yusuke holding the cords out to him with one brow raised, clearly questioning if he was okay. "The tangle seemed worse than it actually was," he said once Akira had waved him off. "Which makes sense, I suppose - I can't imagine Futaba allowing her wires to become so knotted, any more than I could let my brushes fall into disrepair."

That was the second time that day that Yusuke had compared Futaba to himself - to an artist - but Akira didn't give himself any time to think on what that could mean as he cleared his throat and looked away from Yusuke, still feeling his heart beating faster than it had any right to from how hard he'd just jumped; his cheeks felt warm enough even to him that he had no doubt they were bright red.

"Well, what have you two been getting up to?"

Akira almost jumped once more, but caught himself just in time - and looked up and across his attic room to see Futaba standing just by the stairs, her arms laden down a pot of curry and a pile of bowls, both brows raised as she stared right back at him.

She must have spotted his blush, because her grin became nothing short of wicked. Before she could even get a single word out, Akira had jumped to his feet, using some of the fluid grace and speed that were such a boon to their operations in the Metaverse, and made his way over to Futaba. "Here," he said, voice tight - a warning hissed through teeth clenched in a 'grin' that was an implicit threat. "Let me help with that. You're so clumsy I'm amazed you made it this far without an accident."

"Let alone up the stairs," Yusuke agreed. Akira didn't take his eyes off of Futaba, trying to communicate _keep quiet_ as hard as he could through his glare.

She didn't look daunted (quite the opposite; her grin, if possible, _widened_ ), but she didn't say a word as she handed him the pot and stepped into the room proper, so Akira counted that as a win - a message properly given and received.

(That wouldn't, he knew, keep him safe from the interrogation that was sure to come later - or from whatever questions Futaba would have after she played back what had happened in her absence; despite his best efforts, Akira hadn't managed to get out of her where, exactly, she had placed her bugs in Leblanc. He didn't know how many were in his room - if there were, indeed, any actually in there at all - and if they were simply limited to audio, like she'd implied the ones downstairs were. Considering she'd made a habit of hacking his phone camera, he wasn't sure he could trust her word or morals on that one, and it was that exact paranoia fuel that had him changing his clothes in either the bathhouse or Leblanc's downstairs, cramped, sink-and-toilet-only bathroom.)

"Oh, shut up," she huffed, walking over to Akira's bed and claiming it as her rightful throne with a curl of her legs. "I'm not that bad, and I've seen both of you trip over thin air in battle. You don't get to point fingers at me, you hypocrites."

Automatically, Akira looked across at Yusuke, and without a word spoken, they exchanged a conversation with a look. Akira would have pondered obsessively over all of the nuances and micro-expressions he could just see and understand that crossed over Yusuke's face in the span of that brief glance, but there was honestly something a little more pressing to attend to - "Hypocrites?" He said, looking between Yusuke and Futaba with a grin playing on his lips. "I don't know about you, Yusuke, but I feel like falling over in the midst of battle and tripping over thin air are two very different things."

Yusuke nodded. "Indeed," he said, and shot Futaba a look filled with no small amount of fond amusement.

She huffed. "Ah, whatever," she said. "Think what you want! It doesn't matter, because this conversation is over. And I'm hungry." She looked over her shoulder and frowned at Akira. "What are you still doing over there, _you're_ the one with the curry."

Inwardly rolling his eyes, Akira stepped forward and placed the pot down on his desk, gently nudging to the side some of the wires Yusuke had left there rather than hand back to him. "Yeah, well, _you're_ the one with the bowls," he shot back and looked at her expectantly as he made to pull the small, low table out from where he'd shoved it against the wall, and pushed it into the centre of the room. "And we're not eating on my bed, so get over here."

Futaba rolled her eyes. "It's not like curry has crumbs for us to spill all over your sheets," she pointed out. "And besides, your bed is already coated in about three hundred layers of Mona fur. Given that, you'd think that some curry spillage would be a nice change."

"Hey, Yusuke," Akira said, lowering himself to the floor and curling his legs up underneath him. "Come sit with me and bring the pot down with you. Who needs bowls to eat curry?"

"Of course," Yusuke said, smoothly rising to his feet and lifting up the pot - easily ignoring the outraged noises Futaba was making as he walked over to Akira, and sat down right next to him.

His heartbeat started going wild, but he kept up his poker face, and let a lazy smirk drift Futaba's way. "Are you going to join us?" He asked.

She pouted, but jumped down from his bed. "Here," she grumbled, and shoved the bowls into his chest. She sat down across from him and Yusuke, and slid her legs underneath the table. Her feet kicked into his legs, and Akira was very glad he'd chosen to wear full length pants instead of shorts that morning, despite the oppressive summer heat.

Easily, Akira started dishing the curry up into the bowls - Futaba had handed them to him, after all, and he'd just grown used to being in charge of how _anything_ got split up between members of the group in order to avoid arguments over stupid things. Handing the first one over to Futaba, she took it with a happy hum and a _thanks for the meal!_ that had him smiling, even as he wanted to chastise her to wait for five seconds while he finished getting his and Yusuke's ready.

Once his bowl was in hand, a faint frown flickered to life across Yusuke's face. "No rice?" he asked, and Akira paused as Futaba rolled her eyes.

"Inari, it doesn't need rice." She jabbed across the table at him with a fork she must have been carrying on her, because Akira and Yusuke both only had spoons brought up from the kitchen below. "You said you were hungry, right? So just eat the curry."

There was still the slight crease of a frown visible in-between Yusuke's eyes once Futaba had turned her attention back to her bowl, and so Akira shovelled a spoonful of curry into his mouth before it could do something stupid, like offer to go downstairs and prepare some rice just for Yusuke, if he really wanted it. Not only would that just give Futaba more teasing material - but Sojiro would probably join in, and it would lessen the amount of time that he actually got to spend with Yusuke (especially next to him like this, with their arms brushing, which was _very_ nice). Besides, Futaba was right - it didn't really need the rice. Sojiro's curry was one of the most delicious things he'd ever tasted, and it was pretty much perfect on its own.

"Boss is teaching you the recipe for this, isn't he?" Between mouthfuls, Yusuke shot him a sideways, questioning look. "How is that going?"

Akira made a gesture asking for a second as he chewed through the food he'd just put in his mouth, and swallowed before speaking. "It's going," he said ruefully, and Futaba laughed.

"His curry doesn't taste _bad_ ," she said. "But when you compare it to Sojiro's? Then, right now, there's just something _off_ about it." Her grin was probably meant to be comforting, or some sort of consolation, but it just came off to Akira as evil.

He rolled his eyes. "Thanks, Futaba."

She shrugged. "Well, you'll get there one day," she said. "Your coffee did - though, granted, I never did actually get to taste your first attempts for that." She scrunched up her nose. "Actually, wait, I think I'm glad about that."

Akira snorted, and Yusuke let out a small hum of agreement. "It's far better now," he said. "I, too, wasn't around for his first attempts, which I am thankful for, because the first few cups he brewed for me were...not the greatest."

It was the closest Yusuke had ever come to insulting him, and Akira fought the urge to pout, feeling almost childishly slighted - it wasn't like he'd said anything that wasn't true; that he didn't already know himself.

Futaba's eyes were wide as she leant across the table. "Oh, wow," she said. "Am I ever glad I'm not Ann or Makoto. Poor things, having to drink Akira's poison."

Akira raised an eyebrow. "Just those two?" He asked. "What about Ryuji?"

Futaba's snort and following mutter of _'what_ about _Ryuji'_ was only just barely audible over Yusuke's surprised question. "Ryuji drank your coffee?"

Sheepish, Akira laughed. "Yeah, and it was awful," he said ruefully. "I'm pretty sure it was the first actual coffee he'd ever had -"

"- and, considering it was so awful, he's decided all coffee is bad and sworn never to drink it again." Futaba flung an arm out and pointed a finger straight at Akira like she was accusing him of some great crime. "You turned Ryuji against coffee!"

Yusuke made a choked, strangled sound into his curry that may have been a laugh.

Akira stared at the finger that was almost right in his face coolly, his face blank. "You've got that wrong," he said softly, and Futaba blinked. "Even if my coffee hadn't taste bad, can you honestly imagine Ryuji drinking it at all? Willingly?"

"It does seem slightly too cultured for him," Yusuke agreed, slightly breathless with laughter still clear in his voice, but apparently recovered enough to sit up straight from where he'd been hunched over his bowl with shoulders shaking, and re-join the conversation. "He's definitely more of a soda person."

"Or maybe he'd like tea," Futaba suggested. "You can get some pretty fruity flavours. There's this one berry one - it was like, bright pink - that my mum liked. It tasted pretty much like cordial."

Akira made a face. "Warm cordial," he said. "Blech."

"Hot Kool-Aid," Futaba agreed, and Akira was about five hundred percent certain that a reference had just been made that went over both his and Yusuke's head. Well - it wasn't like that was anything new, when it came to Futaba.

The willingness to talk about her mother, though - and with such a soft, heartbreakingly fond smile on her face - that was new, at least a little, and Akira found himself smiling too, just out of happiness for her and how well she was doing.

An elbow dug into his side, just a little too hard to be another of the accidental touches that he and Yusuke had been brushing up against each other, and his gaze flicked to look at the boy next to him - he didn't speak, though there was a question burning now in his mind and clear in his eyes. Yusuke had clearly been going for subtlety in that surreptitious nudge, and so Akira would do the same in turn.

And just from that glance, he was left pretty much breathless.

The afternoon sun coming through his thin curtains was a hazy orange, illuminating every mote of dust that filled the room despite his earnest efforts to wipe down every surface in his room at least once daily, and the warm, glowing backdrop that surrounded Yusuke because of this was ethereal - almost heavenly. His eyes, too, were lit up with a different sort of light - a gentle but deep affection as he stared at Akira and inclined his head in Futaba's direction.

Just like before, there was a conversation in that look he was being given, and Akira could read it as easily as breathing (even as he wondered if there was anything on his own face for Yusuke to read in turn besides stupefied, dumbstruck awe).

Pride, and satisfaction. A happiness that came not from feeling achievement, but from seeing progress.

 _She's doing good,_ that look said. _We've_ _done good_.

Cheekily, Akira smiled back at him, and it was at that moment that Futaba placed her bowl down on the table with a clink of cheap ceramic and cutlery - apparently noticing that the other two people in the room were taking part in a conversation that she had no hope or way of joining.

"Hey," she said, tone thick with suspicion as she looked between them. "Are you two talking about me?"

**|now|**

"What are the two of you talking about?" Akira leaned over Shiho's shoulder, where she was sitting at one of the booths at the back of the cafe, and laughing with Ann over a video call as they waited for him to arrive. "Me?"

 _"You wish!"_ Ann's voice was slightly tinny through the cheap, in built speakers of Shiho's laptop, and Akira shot her a grin as Shiho shuffled a little to the side so he could sit beside her, with both of them in front of the screen and web-cam.

"Afternoon, Akira-kun," she said, smiling at him. "It's good to see you!"

His returning smile was automatic, lips turning upward without his conscious permission or effort - but no less genuine for that fact. It was just a special aspect of some aura that surrounded the existence of pure light known as Shiho Suzui - you couldn't be anything but warm and happy in her presence. It was a fact of life, a law of the universe.

"It's good to see you too, Shiho," he said, and turned his grin to the screen, where Ann and her bedroom were visible. "Hey, Ann."

 _"Hey there, stranger,"_ she said, and there was a certain coy flirtation to her voice that had Akira rolling his eyes even as Shiho giggled and blushed a pretty pink. He knew when Ann was teasing - and, more than that, knew that out of the two people in on the call with her, he wasn't her first pick for a target to flirt with. _"How's life in your neck of the woods."_

"Lonely," Akira said. "And hot, really hot."

"Ah - sorry about that, Akira-kun," Shiho said, and she was so earnestly apologetic in her tone and manner that Akira had to pause for a second and work through whether or not she was actually saying sorry on behalf of their wacky, way too hot for spring weather, or if she was teasing him.

 _"Don't be sorry, Shiho,"_ Ann interjected before Akira could parse the answer out. _"He should feel blessed by your very presence."_

The pink staining Shiho's cheeks flared to a deeper red, and she ducked her head into her arms with a faint groan as Akira assured Ann that he was, very much, blessed by her very presence.

"So, what is it you wanted to talk about?" He asked a minute or so later, once Ann had laughed her amusement out of her system, Shiho had recovered from her brief bluescreen of death, and he'd ordered an iced-coffee with a veritable mountain of spray cream over the top of it.

 _"That looks delicious,"_ Ann sighed, eyeing his drink with an envious stare, and he grinned instead of telling her that it tasted kind of awful - generic coffee shop fare just didn't compare after getting used to Leblanc. But hey, it was cold, which automatically made it the best thing he'd consumed all goddamn day.

Shiho hummed around her straw as she took a sip of her equally icy looking fruit drink. "I'm so glad this cafe has air conditioning," she mumbled, and Akira let out a groan of agreement.

On the screen, Ann was looking between the two of them with no small amount of exasperated amusement clear on her face. _"You poor country bumpkins,"_ she laughed. _"But hey - if it's that hot where you are, that makes selling the pitch all that much easier."_

Akira blinked once he'd registered her words, and he sent Shiho a questioning look - only to see her looking back at him with an equal amount of confusion in her expression, the same questions he had visible in her eyes. Clearly, she had about as much knowledge of what Ann was talking about as he did.

"Pitch?" He asked.

Immediately, Ann shifted on screen, like she was trying to escape his gaze. There was sly curl to her lips and a pink tinge on her cheeks, and Akira found himself torn between burning curiosity and abject fear.

 _“There’s still some time before the new school year starts up,”_ Ann said, and shot them a nervous grin – even through the low, grainy quality of her laptop’s inbuilt webcam, Akira could pick up on her anxiety. It came off as almost slightly guilty, which had him narrowing his eyes, because Ann only ever sounded like that if she had an idea that had a good chance of getting them all in trouble.

A quick glance at Shiho showed the same caution he felt tightening the features of her face – slightly gratified, Akira grinned.

“Yeah, there is,” he agreed. “What, do you want to meet up in the city or something?” Honestly, he wasn’t opposed to the idea – far from it, actually; he missed his friends something fierce, a physical ache inside that he hadn’t thought was possible to feel for people he still talked to every day. The commute even just one way into Tokyo was a little hard to justify for just a daytrip, but Akira would find a way to make it work – even try to convince his parents to let him stay overnight if he could, though he doubted they’d be willing to let him (they’d been overprotective and worried about having him out of sight since his return home from Tokyo; he loved them for it even as it exasperated him).

“ _Something like that,”_ Ann agreed, tugging on one of her ponytails and biting at her lip in a nervous tic that was incredibly familiar to Akira, and had him raising his eyebrows. She huffed out a short laugh, and averted her eyes from their gazes. “ _Have you talked to Haru lately?”_

Shiho tilted her head. “Okumura-senpai?” She asked. “No, not me.”

“Not for a couple of days, for me,” Akira said. “I figured she was busy getting ready for university.”

“ _She is!”_ Ann agreed brightly, a genuine smile crossing her face and pride filling her voice. “ _She and Makoto are both working really hard, though I’m not sure they really have any reason to worry. They’re both going to do great.”_

Smiling fondly, Akira agreed. “So what is it, then?” He asked. “If it’s something that Haru wants to tell us – ”

“ _You know how she’s been trying to improve the image of Okumura foods? Well, she’s been reaching out to the company’s older business partners to try and make connections.”_ Ann grinned at him. “ _You’ve heard of the Kirijo Corporation, right?”_

Akira raised a brow at her, thinking of the logo emblazoned on his parent’s computers and about a million of Futaba’s pieces of tech, to say nothing of the influence they had in advertisement and media. “How could I have not?” He asked. “I’ve been living in Shinokawa, not under a _rock_.”

“ _What’s the difference?”_ Ann asked cheerfully, not even skipping a beat in her hurry to take advantage of his country bumpkin roots to mock him.

“Ha,” he said, mock hurt in his voice as both Shiho and Ann giggled.

After calming herself, Shiho took a sip of her drink, shoulders still shaking with faint laughter, and a smile visible in the way her lips curled around her bright pink straw. “So Okumura-senpai is making deals with the Kirijo Corp., huh?”

“ _They reached out to her, apparently.”_ Ann said. “ _The current head of the Kirijo lost her father too, when she was about Haru’s age, and she had to take over responsibility for the company. She probably felt for Haru, I think.”_

Akira was quiet for a minute, and Shiho stared down at her drink, ice clinking the glass as she played with her straw. “That makes sense,” she said softly. “I’m glad Okumura-senpai is getting help with her business from someone who can understand.”

Ann nodded, her ponytails bouncing with the eager movement. “ _I think she’s feeling a bit more settled, too. I’m glad.”_ A smile, as bright as the sun. “ _It’s good to see her more assured of herself out of the Metaverse.”_

Shiho blinked, curiosity alight in her eyes, like there always was whenever they mentioned their escapades as the Phantom Thieves. She never asked any questions, just waited for them to offer up information on their own – but this time, Akira could tell she really wanted to. She’d never seen Haru how she’d been when she was Noir – more outgoing, more outwardly confident. Haru always had that same steel core and inner strength wherever she was; she just showed it less outside of the Metaverse.

“So how does this all connect to your ‘idea?’” Akira asked. “You’re talking us into a winding trail, Ann.”

Ann sputtered. “ _Shut up, Akira,_ ” she said. “ _I’m nervous, okay?”_

“But why?” Shiho sounded bewildered. “It’s just us.”

Akira snorted. “Yeah, but it’s also _Ann_.” Shiho laughed in agreement, and onscreen Ann pouted – but he could see the smile tugging at the corners of her lips. “Shiho has a point though – no need to be so nervous when it’s just us.”

“ _I know, I know,”_ Ann said. “ _It’s more that I’m nervous you’ll say no? I’ve – I’ve missed you guys, you know?”_

Akira ducked his head, touched. That ache in his chest that he’d felt every day since leaving Tokyo, in the place where the chains of his bonds had once linked to – it was suffused with a warmth that came not just from Ann’s words, but from the feelings he could sense behind them.

“I’ve missed you too,” he said quietly. “All of you.”

Ann’s smile was slightly watery, and Akira tactfully didn’t mention it as she tried to subtly wipe at her eyes. “ _Anyway,”_ she said, and clapped her hands together, as if banishing the melancholy with the surprisingly loud sound that echoed out, “ _The Kirijo Corp. own a stretch of private beach on Yakushima. I’m not sure of the exact circumstances, but they’re letting Haru use it for a few days.”_ A wicked grin, as both Akira and Shiho perked up – undeniably interested, both in the idea of an escape from the heat via privately owned beach, as well as the idea of just spending a few days having fun with friends before responsibilities dragged them all back into real life.

 _“So,”_ she said, with a certain smugness around her that echoed the feline nature of her once codename, _“Think you're up for a road trip?”_

**|then|**

“Hey, Inari - how do you feel about a little road trip?”

Yusuke blinked, and looked up from the blank page of his sketchbook that he’d been staring at for – well. A while. He wasn’t quite sure of how long he’d been sitting in his stupor, and a glance at the time on his phone didn’t help much because he had no honest idea of when he’d sat down in the first place. That was how he’d been making it through most of his days – listless, and dreading the passing of time.

So to hear Futaba’s voice, cheerful and bright as it had ever been, when she had been just as upset as the rest of them about Akira’s impending, looming departure…

“Pardon?” He asked, and closed his sketchbook as he turned his attention towards her, resisting the urge to shove it away from him. His inspiration had been suffering of late, and the bright white of the empty pages hurt both his eyes and his heart to look at. “A road trip?”

Futaba’s answering grin was nothing short of sinister – almost evil, he dared to think – and if he had been anyone else, he probably would have been worried about the way the overhead light glinted off of her glasses. However, he knew her well enough to know that she was far from malicious (…most of the time, at least), so whatever it was that had cheered her up was likely a good thing.

She walked down from where she had been standing on the stairs that led up to Akira’s room in Leblanc’s attic – he wasn’t in right now, but rather doing something off in the city; taking advantage of the time he had left in Tokyo to spend it with as many of his friends as possible. As she slid across from him, into the booth he’d positioned himself in earlier, he wondered at how Leblanc had become more than just the centre of their operations, but the centre of their group as a whole. Even Ryuji, the least likely of all of them to want to spend time in a coffee shop, would find his way to the café most afternoons. It had become like…a second home to all of them, almost.

(A first home, for Yusuke, though he was reluctant to admit that out loud. If he said it, it would feel like dishonouring the memory of his once sensei – though Madarame had been amongst the worst of men, and Yusuke could not forgive him…he could not forget him, either, nor make himself stop loving him.

His friends would more than likely understand his feelings, but he felt as if he was already enough of a burden to them – they may speak of it in a joking manner, but he knew they all worried about how much he ate, how much he spent, how he lived. It was heart-warming, even as he wanted them to stop, a little bit – it made him feel like a burden, which was the last thing he ever wanted to be to them.)

“A road trip,” Futaba repeated, her voice determined cheer. “If Akira has to go home, then we’re going to take him. And we’re going to make it _fun_.”

Yusuke raised a brow at her. “Do you have a plan beyond that, or is that all we’re working with?”

She rolled her eyes at him. “Hush, Inari,” she said. “This isn’t the time for your sarcasm! I’ve gotten permission from Sojiro, and Makoto said she’s good to drive – everyone’s already cleared out their schedules.”

“And yet, only now do you tell me of these plans?” He frowned. “I’d be hurt, if it wasn’t you.”

“And I would have told you earlier, if it wasn’t _you_ ,” she shot back. “We’re trying to keep it a secret from Akira, and you’re weak to his charm. Besides, I already knew you had nothing else planned for the break, and even if you did, like you wouldn’t drop it the moment you got offered time to spend with Akira.”

Yusuke tried his hardest not to look terribly affronted, even as a voice in the back of his mind whispered that what she said was probably (definitely) true. “And you’re telling me now, then, instead of the moment before we leave because…?” He trailed off, leaving the sentence open for her to continue and explain.

“We’ve got a second hand van all sorted out for the trip,” she said, and grinned. “It needs some touching up, and everyone else is busy – so get out your paint brushes, Inari, because it’s time to get some art done.”

Yusuke perked up a little – excited despite himself – and was torn between laughing and shaking his head not even ten minutes later, once Futaba had led him to the place behind her house where the van had been parked.

“Your idea of art, Futaba,” he said softly, repressed laughter making his voice tight, “could truly use some work.”

She scoffed. “My idea of art is fine, _elitist_.”

The noise Yusuke made was inhuman. “I – I am not an elitist,” he protested, and she ignored him as she pranced forward. “Futaba, I am not an elitist – ”

“Jeez, take a joke, Inari.” The grin she threw him over her shoulder as she crouched down beside the van and held up two paint brushes belied the harshness of her words to her tone and manner. “Art’s what you make of it, right? So let’s make some together!”

For a moment, he can only stare – and then he smiled, and closed his eyes briefly. Not even an hour earlier he’d been in the depths of quiet misery, unable to even think of picking up pen or brush, and now he stood before a rusted van with a flaking coat of yellowed white paint, holding a never before used brush, preparing to dip it into the newly opened can of sky blue paint.

It’s a sort of easy freedom he doesn’t remember ever having before, and just the motions of slapping paint messily onto the van alongside Futaba is soothing – the pain of knowing that all of this is work towards sending Akira away from them (away from _him_ ) is still there, but lessened; not so much a stinging fire as it is just a simple lingering ache.

“Thank you, Futaba, for bringing me here with you today,” he said softly. “It was a good idea, and I’ve had a lot of fun.” He sent her a small smile. “I wonder why we haven’t spent more time together.”

“Because you’re always too busy mooning over Akira and I don’t want to watch you two make lovey-dovey eyes at each other,” she muttered, looking away from him – probably trying to hide the blush he could see painting her cheeks red. “But – I’ve had a lot of fun too, today.” She blinked back at him, cautiously. “Next year, when Akira isn’t here…” she trailed off. “No, actually, never mind. It isn’t important right now.”

Yusuke tilted his head, slightly confused. “If you say so,” he said, easily enough. The trick to getting Futaba to talk to you was in letting her open up in her own time. There was no point in forcing it – she’d share what was on her mind with him soon enough. “How many coats of paint are we doing?” He asked, in an attempt to change the subject.

Futaba blinked. “Uh,” she said. “I dunno?” She shrugged. “However many it needs?”

Before he could catch himself, Yusuke snorted. “A sound plan,” he said, and Futaba smirked in agreement.

“Hell yeah,” she said, and looked back at the van, half blue by now and dripping. Yusuke hoped that Boss (and the people of Yongen-Jaya in general) wouldn’t be too bothered by the asphalt being stained the colour of a summer sky around where the van stood. “He’ll like it, don’t you think?”

Yusuke stared at the van. It was, in a word, a mess.

“He’ll love it,” he said. “No doubt about it.”

**|now|**

“No doubt about it,” Futaba muttered, and Yusuke glanced up from his pile of books. They were sitting up in the attic – Akira’s attic, even though his belongings no longer rested on the shelves, instead replaced by Yusuke’s own. He’d barely been moved in a week and he still felt guilty about it; though Boss had reassured him that he was more than welcome, he couldn’t help but feel he was taking Akira’s space away from him…and he knew, very well, just what it meant to have your own ‘space.’

Futaba had laughed at his concerns. _When Akira comes back,_ she’d said ( _when,_ not if, and with definite intonations of _home_ to the word _back_ ), _He has his own room in the house waiting for him. He doesn’t need the attic anymore – and I doubt he’d mind sharing with you anyway_. She’d nudged him in the side with her elbow as Yusuke had tried valiantly not to blush. _Besides, isn’t this better than the Kosei dorms?_

It was, very much so – he couldn’t deny it. And that some of his scholarship was no longer going towards paying food and board…it made the administration more amenable to buying him the paints and canvases he needed. And that it placed him closer to Futaba, who was planning to join him at Kosei once the school year began, as well as closer to the rest of his friends (and Boss’ coffee), was just the added bonus.

The only thing missing, really, was Akira himself – but there was no point in dwelling on that, especially not when, as far as Yusuke was aware, Ann was in a call with Akira and Shiho right at that moment, trying to sell them on coming on a weekend trip with them to a private beach owned by friends of Haru’s.

He shook his mind clear. “No doubt about what?” he asked, and Futaba jumped – jerking around in her seat to stare at him with wide eyes, like she’d forgotten he was there at all, even though it was technically _his_ room.

Something faintly guilty flickered across her expression, and her hands fluttered at her sides as if she longed to reach out and slam her laptop closed.

Yusuke narrowed his eyes.

“Futaba,” he said carefully. “No doubt about _what_?” He tried to imitate the stern tones of authority he’d heard in both Boss’ and Joker’s voices when addressing the team – he was far from a model big brother figure, but he would try his hardest to be a responsible, trustworthy friend.

For a moment, Futaba seemed to hover on the edge of keeping quiet, conflicted – but then she sighed, and sat back down in her seat; backwards this time, arms resting along the back and her legs slung over the sides.

“I’ve been looking into the Kirijo Corp.,” she said. “Please don’t tell anyone just yet.”

Yusuke stared. “…why?” He asked. He trusted that Futaba must have a good reason for doing it – more than just a hacker’s curiosity.

“The Kirijo Group has their fingers in a lot of pots, you know?” She said. “Media, technology, _automobiles_.” Her gaze was piercing, and more serious than he’d seen it since their crusade to prove Akira’s innocence. “That van that tried to track us to Shinokawa, and the people that have been watching us – they’re with Kirijo, I’m sure of it.” She gestured to her laptop. “I’ve been trying to hack them since before Akira even left Tokyo, but they’ve got someone skilled on their side. They’ve been blocking my every attempt, throwing up firewalls left and right so fast that it’s almost contradictory. The response time and ingenuity is purely human, but how fast the tech works is something automatic. I guess it makes sense – the Kirijo have more than enough money to pay for the best.” A smug smirk. “Well, _second best_ ,” she corrected. “It may have taken me a while, but I triumphed, like I always do.”

“And now?” Yusuke asked.

“Well, like I said – there’s no doubt about it now,” she said. “Some of the encryptions are beyond even me to get through without direct access to one of the servers they’re stored on, but.” She bit her lip. “They have files on us, Yusuke. Just basic dossiers, on the first level, but – there’s more under tougher locks. Locks I can’t get through without access to Kirijo servers.”

Yusuke narrowed his eyes. “Like the ones you’ll likely be able to find on Yakushima, given that it’s a Kirijo Corp. location we’re going to.”

Futaba nodded. “A long shot, yeah,” she said quietly. “But seeing this has made me nervous – _scared_ , Yusuke. I’m scared.” Her eyes met his, determined. “I need to figure out what’s going on with the Kirijo – and you can’t tell anyone! Not yet. If they’re this good at protecting their info, they can get through the guards I’ve put on _ours_. Phone, text, email, anonymous post on the Phansite – they could track it to us, and know that we’re on to them. Until we’re all together, in person, no one else can know about this, okay?”

Slowly, Yusuke nodded. His head was spinning slightly from everything Futaba had just told him – the idea of a mega corporation such as the Kirijo group keeping watch on them was disturbing on a level he wasn’t quite sure he could put name to – did they know they were the Phantom Thieves? What, exactly, were they hoping (or planning) to gain from them?

He wanted to talk to Akira about it. Even acknowledging Futaba’s words and logic, it was what he _wanted_ to do. Though he’d been a member of the Thieves longer than anyone except the ‘founding members,’ he’d never held any sort of position of authority, beyond maybe being a frontline fighter. Even Makoto and Futaba, who had come after him, had had more of a position of leadership than he had, being strategist and navigator respectively.

His lot in the team had never upset him – he’d always been more than content to follow the lead of Joker and Queen – but in that moment, with Futaba looking at him with complete trust and faith, like just by sharing her worries with him she felt better, safer…it was warming and terrifying in equal measure. Is this what Akira had felt like, each time he led them into battle? Or even each time he’d helped them through their problems?

He sighed. “I don’t think the area we’ll be staying in _is_ the Kirijo facility,” he said. “How are you planning to get in?”

Futaba smirked. “Mona’s going to help me,” she said. “Just a little lost girl, looking for her cat.”

Yusuke tilted his head. “If there aren’t many personnel that _might_ work,” he allowed. “Do you have a backup plan?”

“What would I need a backup plan for?” She asked, blinking in a feigned innocence. “I’ve got you guys.”

“A heart-warming concept, and I’m truly touched by your words, but that’s a frightening lack of logic, Futaba.”

She stuck her tongue out at him, and Yusuke breathed easier as the atmosphere tangibly lightened. The weight of what Futaba had revealed and the absence of their friends was still a tension on their shoulders they didn’t really need – but it was nothing they could deal with now, so the best thing was to just try and relax; put it out of their minds.

“Ann should be getting back to us soon,” Futaba said, glancing down at her phone. “You think they’re going to say yes?”

Yusuke thought about all the times he’d talked to Akira that spring – conversations via text that had continued late into the night and that one time they’d tried to watch a movie long distance together and Akira had fallen asleep barely ten minutes in – Yusuke hadn’t even registered anything that had happened in the movie, too preoccupied with the sound of Akira’s faint snores coming over the line.

Through all that time they’d talked, Yusuke had picked up on more than just the words spoken. He wasn’t sure what conclusions the others had come to, but he knew that Akira loved his parents, just as they loved him – almost stiflingly so of late; his mother reluctant to have him out of the house for too long. From everything he’d heard about Alice Kurusu, she’d had intense anxiety for years – she didn’t like having her son away from her.

“I think Akira will want to come,” he said. “I’m not quite sure he’ll be _allowed_ to, however.”

Futaba scowled. “Well, he _better_ ,” she said. “If he doesn’t, he’ll regret it.”

**|then|**

“I already regret this,” Akira said, looking for all the world like _he_ was about to be the next person to try and throw themselves out of the moving van. Yusuke had been half joking when he had moved to do so, but Akira’s expression was so pained and pinched that he couldn’t tell if he was acting or not.

"Oh, lighten up." From up in the front passenger seat beside Makoto, Ann grinned over her shoulder at Akira. “You big, whining baby.”

Akira stuck his tongue out at her, and Yusuke had to bite back a laugh.

“The front passenger seat is reserved for a responsible navigator and pair of eyes,” Makoto said lightly. “If you’re too busy making faces at Akira, Ann, I can get Haru up here instead.”

“No, no, I’ll focus!” Ann yelped, turning around so that she was facing forwards properly, going as far as to take her phone out and open Mapp to show how seriously she was taking the job Makoto had volunteered her for. “Please don’t banish me to the backseat.”

“Tell me which turn I need to take up ahead and I’ll consider having mercy.” Makoto’s voice was an amused hum, and Yusuke could very clearly hear the smile in it even as he couldn’t see her face.

“On it!” With that, Ann started tapping away at her screen, chattering happily to Makoto – who didn’t seem to mind noise, so long as everyone was in their seats properly. Riding in a normal van was a bit different to driving through Mementos in Mona – there, no one had worn seatbelts, whereas here, Makoto and Haru had glared and pouted respectively until they’d all acquiesced to strapping themselves in. Even more so was the fact that this van had seats in the back, while as more and more people had joined the Phantom Thieves Morgana’s car form had shifted to have only the driver’s seat up in the front, the rest of the van a cavernous space they could just all pile into and out of easily; all the better to help them fight enemies or escape them quickly.

It was also strange to have Morgana himself in the car with them for once, rather than as the actual vehicle instead. In the cat form he was no longer to change out of, he sat happily in Akira's lap, ears and tail occasionally twitching as the van moved down the highway.

"So what's the plan?" Akira asked, glancing around the van. "You said you're not taking me home straight away...so where are we going?" Yusuke knew that his shrewd eyes had already turned the van nearly upside down in his mind, and that the only reason he was asking this now was because that just by looking at what bags they'd piled up in the back and at their feet, he couldn't guess a solid location for their planned destination. Yusuke and Futaba had planned it like that and packed accordingly - and thus shared a smug, pleased look when they picked up on the confusion in his voice.

“That’s for us to know, and you to agonize over figuring out,” Futaba said, smug as a cat. Akira actually pouted at her, and turned back to stare down at the real cat sitting in his lap.

“Morgana,” he said. “Do _you_ know where we’re going?”

“Of course!” Morgana grinned. “I’m not going to tell you, of course.”

Akira sighed, and slumped into his seat. “I hate _all_ of you,” he muttered, and laughter spread quietly throughout the car.

“Dude,” Ryuji said. “You can’t fool us. We _know_ we’re your favourite people in the world. You _love_ us.”

Akira shot him a look that pretty much screamed _are you sure about that?_ And Yusuke rolled his eyes. “Our destination isn’t far away,” he said, leaning forward to rest his chin on the back of the seat next to Akira. “We’ll probably be there within the hour, so just wait.”

Akira frowned. “An hour?” He asked. “And before we hit Shinokawa…” he trailed off, his brows furrowing as he slumped back into his seat, muttering under his breath.

Yusuke traded a grin with Makoto, who was looking back at them through the rear view mirror, her red eyes lit up with mirth.

“You’re not going to figure it out, Akira,” Futaba said.

“Oh ye of little faith,” Akira said.

“You’re smart, Akira,” Makoto allowed with a laugh. “But you’re not exactly a detective – and you barely have any clues to work with in the first place.”

“I have travelled the road from Tokyo to Shinokawa more times than any of you combined, probably,” he pointed out. “The only issue with figuring it out now is whether or not you’re taking us on any back roads.” He narrowed his eyes at the back of Makoto’s head, as if the set of her shoulders would give him an answer either way.

Makoto hummed. “Backroads, huh? Who knows?”

The sigh that hissed through Akira’s teeth was pure exasperation, but there was a smile playing on his lips as he looked back at Futaba and Yusuke. “You’re all traitors,” he said, and there was no bite to his tone at all.

“Considering we’re a democracy, I’d rather see it as you being outvoted,” Futaba said. “Majority rules, Akira.”

“I don’t recall ever agreeing to such terms,” Akira’s pout was, in a word, adorable. “I thought the leader thing meant you’d all listen to me.”

“Only when you’re not being an idiot,” Futaba said agreeably. “Or when we’re trying to give you a nice surprise.” Her tone was pointed as she finished speaking, and that tension that built up between her and Akira quite often that was still friendly at the core was tangible in the small, enclosed space of the van.

It was as Akira was opening his mouth once more that Yusuke leant forward, interjecting himself, quite literally, into the middle of their discussion. "Your impatience is truly legendary," he said, and the faint traces of annoyance crinkling around the edges of Akira's eyes bled into a soft smile. "But we're not going to tell you - not even to get you to shut up."

If Akira felt bad at being caught at playing a tactic he'd made rare use of back in Tokyo, he didn't show it at all - his grin simply growing even wider as he truly relaxed back into his seat, head lolling back to press his forehead briefly to Yusuke's cheek.

He was smiling, too, as he leant away and pushed Akira back into a proper seating position. "Sit properly, or Makoto will scold you," he muttered, and Futaba snorted as Haru giggled.

"You're _such_ a cat, Akira," she said, and on his lap Morgana let out a huff.

"If we switched bodies, we'd both be happy," he sighed, "So why am _I_ the one left as a cat?"

"Because I'm cuter," Akira said, the speed of his response making it seem as though the answer was automatic.

"We all know _that's_ a lie," Morgana snapped back, just as fast, and Futaba hummed a bemused agreement from her perch behind them - she always had liked egging them on; Yusuke supposed it was just a little sister thing.

Yusuke’s focus on the conversation – the banter, the light hearted bickering – faded with his attention as he leant back in his seat and just stared at the back of Akira’s head, as subtly as he could. There wasn’t any real intent behind his gaze; it wasn’t a glare, nor was he trying to draw Akira’s attention to himself – he was just…thinking.

And Akira happened to be the object of those thoughts.

He sighed, and shifted in his seat to lean up against the side of the car more, the glass of the window chill to touch when he leant his head against it and stared blankly without seeing at the countryside that passed them by at a speed fast enough to induce motion sickness if he stared too hard for too long.

He wanted to talk to Akira – talk to him about what they’d discussed on Christmas Eve, what Akira had revealed that Yusuke didn’t think anyone was _ever_ meant to know, not so long as Akira got what he wanted.

 _He asked for me to wait for him,_ Yusuke thought. _I said that I would._

The thing about that, though, was that neither of them had ever said how long the wait would be. Yusuke was in no rush to push the issue, or to force Akira to make some sort of concession or choice…but when it came down to it, he still felt a little ignored, and hurt. Since Akira’s freedom had been won, he and Yusuke hadn’t spent any significant amount of time alone together, and he had the distinct impression that, at times, Akira was going out of his way to deliberately avoid him.

It made Yusuke wary. It made Yusuke _worry_. Akira was still undeniably Akira, with that same spark of mischief in his eyes, but – he’d spent months in a jail, not knowing if they’d be able to get him out, not knowing that they were even _trying_ to get him out.

He remembered the hopeless, shaken fear that had shone through falling tears on Christmas Eve, and wondered how long it had taken for Akira to really believe that he was getting out, and to put his smile bright on his face before he encountered the rest of them that had been left behind, to their own devices, in order to comfort and reassure them, no doubt – Akira was their leader for more reason than one, and in many ways they had been left lost and floundering, empty and cold as they worked themselves to the bone to get whatever evidence and support they could to get Akira _out_.

He wanted to get Akira to talk – to him or to _anyone_. And that was part of the reason why the Phantom Thieves had planned this small detour before taking Akira all the way home and leaving him alone, in the care of his parents; in the hopes that, maybe, the cheerful mask Akira had kept affixed to his face since he had returned to them would crack a little, so they could get to understanding – if not healing – the real Akira that was hiding beneath.

Yusuke sighed, and closed his eyes. The world outside of the window, a blur of speeding colours, faded to black backlit by red.

And with that few, he let himself fade too – he hadn’t slept well the night before, and if Makoto and the GPS had been right, there was at least an hour left in their drive before they reached their destination, so he felt safe in taking a quick nap.

He opened his eyes what felt like not even a second later, to Futaba’s hand on his shoulder and the amused eyes of the rest of the van resting on him.

He blinked, and pushed himself up into a properly seated position from where he must have slumped over in his sleep, and very much did not blush as he cleared his throat and avoided meeting anyone’s gaze.

“Have we arrived, then?” He asked, and looked directly at Makoto, who – while still looking amused, the corners of her lips quirking up – at least had the dignity to not be giggling at him.

“We have,” she agreed, and opened her door. “Come on, then – out of the van, we’re all grabbing at least one bag.”

Akira raised his brows. “We’re in the middle of nowhere,” he said. “ _Literally_. Unless you’re planning to turn back towards the highway, the only way we have to go is a trail that the van can’t go down.”

“We’re going down that trail,” Makoto said.

“Oh no.” Akira’s voice was only slightly louder than a whisper, and filled with a deep, low horror. “You’re taking me _camping._ ” He sent a look full of accusation Futaba’s way. “You said it was going to be a _nice_ surprise!”

Futaba smiled, and lifted one hand to cover her mouth as she imitated what Yusuke could only call ‘the smug anime laugh,’ which he never would have known in the first place if Futaba herself hadn’t taught it to him by forcing him to marathon show after show with her over the past few months. “I _lied_ ,” she said, and Yusuke rolled his eyes as he exited the van after Ryuji, climbing over the back of the seats to the already open door and wincing as he stretched his stiff limbs.

“It is a nice surprise,” Haru said. “What’s wrong with camping, Akira-kun?”

Akira screwed his face up. “Bugs,” he said. “Dirt; _blegh_.”

Haru blinked. “But you always seemed happy to help me with gardening,” she said, a curl to her lips and an affected shock in her eyes that had Yusuke doubting the innocence she was currently exuding. “We encountered dirt and bugs all the time! And you grew up in a country town, right?”

“Living in a small town is not like camping,” Akira protested. “I lived in a house!”

“Ah,” Futaba said. “ _Luxury_ camping.”

Akira pinched her, and fled the van as she yelped and reached across the seats – probably to pinch him back. He was laughing as he stumbled out, and nearly fell right into Yusuke’s chest.

He caught his balance – Yusuke helping by offering his arm – and the smile Akira sent him as his laughter petered out had him smiling back.

Already, Akira seemed less stressed. Maybe – just maybe – this camping idea would work.

“Here,” Makoto said, from the back side of the van, and the two of them turned just in time to put their hands up in order to catch the bags she threw them before they flew right into their faces.

Akira sputtered. “Makoto, _what_ –” He frowned at her. “A bit of a heads up would have been nice.”

Makoto shrugged. “I did give you one,” she said. “I knew the two of you would be able to catch them in time. If you didn’t, then you’d just need to train your reflexes some more.” Her eyes narrowed. “Thankfully, you’re still just as good as you’ve always been.”

Akira blinked, as if confused by the hard tone that had crept into her voice, but Yusuke could read between the lines and heard the subtext in her words – _even after all these months, you’re still as vigilant as ever_.

It wasn’t a bad thing – but it wasn’t a good thing, either. The Phantom Thieves had never known their leader when he _wasn’t_ always alert and ready for action, and he’d just spent several months in prison, after spending the last year constantly looking over his shoulder – him being a little on edge made sense, was _more_ than expected; hell, _they_ were all still anxious, too.

This camping trip – this escape from Tokyo – wasn’t just for Akira; it was for all of them.

So before Akira could think on it too hard, Yusuke nudged him with his elbow. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go and get these tents set up before it gets much later.”

Akira nodded, agreeing easily enough, even after whining about the dirt and bugs not even five minutes earlier. “Yeah, as romantic as it sounds, I don’t really want to be failing to put a tent up in the dark and have to sleep under the stars.”

Yusuke laughed, and began to walk down the trail to the camping site that Makoto had reassured them the map said was there. “It would make an interesting art piece,” he said. “‘Teenagers, Tentless, Trapped Beneath A Starry Sky.’”

Akira’s laugh was a deep one, one that came from the belly, the kind that induced stiches.

“It wasn’t _that_ funny.” Futaba’s voice was a grumble that came from behind them, and Yusuke glanced back over his shoulder to see her struggling behind them with an icebox in her arms – likely where their dinner was being stored.

“Do you need any help?” Akira asked, the concern in his voice slightly lessened in effect by the laughter that still had him choked up.

Futaba scowled. “I’m _fine_ ,” she said. “It’s just a box of sausages.”

“If you say so,” Akira said, and turned his attention back to where he was walking.

The walk, thankfully, wasn’t a long one – turning back, Yusuke could still see the blue of the van through the gaps in the trees.

Futaba placed the icebox down with a relieved huff, and promptly sat down on top of it.

“You want to help us put the tents up?” Akira asked, and she shook her head.

“I’d rather sit here and watch you do it,” she said. “Maybe give you some instructions if you actually need help.”

“ _Instructions_ ,” Akira said. “I think you mean _orders_.”

“But of course!”

Yusuke pulled the instructions out of his bag. “It doesn’t look _too_ hard,” he said. “Just snap some poles together and thread them through the sleeves made for them in the tent. We’ll be able to figure it out easily enough, I presume.”

Futaba snorted, and the look Akira sent him was somehow supportive even as it was doubting.

As it turned out though, he was at least _somewhat_ right. Snapping the poles together wasn’t hard at all, and as they were getting to the part where they had to actually assemble the tents themselves, Makoto and the others arrived in the clearing that was their campsite, each carrying their own bag. Makoto immediately placed hers down and proceeded to take the chore over herself.

Yusuke in no way felt bad about handing the job over to her, especially when he knew that even if they’d finished assembling the tents before she got there she would have probably taken them down to put them back up herself _right_ in the first place.

While Makoto busied herself with setting up the camp itself, Haru recruited the rest of them to gather firewood for her, while she and Futaba got the food ready to cook. Within the hour, they were all sitting around a warm and flickering fire, disposable plates on their laps piled high with barbequed sausages and vegetables.

While they ate, the campsite was mostly silent, the crackling of the fire and the sounds that came from them all eating the only actual noise beyond just the ambient sounds of the nature that surrounded them.

A breeze that rustled through the clearing brought with it the sound of cicada song, and Yusuke smiled.

"Huh?" Haru blinked. "Isn't it a bit early for the cicadas to be out? It's only spring."

"Yeah, but it's been really hot," Ann pointed out. "I almost wish that we'd decided to do another beach trip instead of camping."

"Blegh," Futaba said, and stuck her tongue out. "It might be hot during the day, but once the sun goes down the temperature gets _arctic_." She shivered, and next to her Akira hummed his agreement.

"Even with the heater going at the highest speed all night, the insulation in Leblanc's attic isn't exactly what I would call _great_ ," he said. "I swear, some nights I thought I was going to freeze to death." He tilted his head, expression considering. "Still not as bad as summer, though, when every night I'd open the window and get eaten alive by mosquitos for the smallest change in temperature ever."

"It's always cold in my room." Futaba grinned. "I've got so many computer parts going in there that I have to keep them at a comfortable temperature."

"How much of your power bill is your computers, Futaba?" Ryuji asked, looking torn between wanting to know and desperately _not_ , as Futaba shrugged in answer.

"I'm not the one taking care of the bills," she said.

Makoto frowned. "You should still have a look into it," she said. "You'll have to know these sorts of things as you get older; it's best to get some experience now, when Sojiro is on hand to help you."

"Yes, Queen," Futaba said, and if she rolled her eyes a little once Makoto's attention was back on her plate - well, Yusuke decided, it wasn't like anyone else needed to know. This was meant to be a holiday for them, after all, and the light hearted banter and teasing had brought a weightlessness to the tension that had surrounded the group throughout the drive earlier that day.

"If you're still going to call me Queen," Makoto said lightly, not looking up from her plate, "then I expect you to treat me like one, too."

Ryuji snorted, quickly covering it up with a choked sounding fit of coughs as Ann drove an elbow into his ribs.

"Well," Haru said. "Even if we don't really have a reason to use the codenames anymore, I don't think we necessarily have to retire them, do you?" She pouted. "I liked being Noir."

"I get that," Ann said. "Panther...I feel like just turning my back on who I was in the Thieves is like - a final goodbye to Carmen." She's quiet, for a moment. "Like I'm trying to forget everything we've been through over the past year."

Ryuji, sitting next to Ann, pressed close enough together that Yusuke almost wants to question if there's anything going on between the two of them that he doesn't know about, that he's somehow managed to miss - lays a hand on her arm, and squeezes. It's a reassuring motion, and Akira, sandwiched between Yusuke and Futaba, leant forward and around Yusuke's arm to send Ann a look that communicated pure comfort.

"Being Joker..." he trailed off, contemplative, before he shook the daze that had overtaken him for a moment back off, "I think it was one of the only things that kept me - not sane, but _hopeful_ , during the months I was locked up. Sae visited when she could, kept me updated on the case against Shido - but it was always super vague info, with no hint of whether or not there was any word on when I was getting out, if I was even going to get out at all. I clung to Joker, then. Maybe he wasn't as physical as he had been in the Metaverse, but he was damn sure still a mask and cloak, and I wore him until I almost forgot that I was Akira, too." There was something haunted in Akira's eyes as he said that, and Yusuke was dropping his plate to the ground before he'd even registered that he'd moved, all so that he could slide his hand into Akira's.

Akira stared, and so did Yusuke, shocked at the own unconscious action his body had taken - stare at where fingers had intertwined around each other, interlocking warmth and holding tight.

He looked up from this point of connection to shoot a partway questioning, partway worried look at Akira - who smiled, and squeezed his hand, tightening his own grip as his thumb rubbed circles into the skin on the back of Yusuke's hand.

"Akira..." Ann spoke up, eyes full of sorrow and apologies, and Akira looked away from Yusuke to shake his head at her, smiling.

"Not your fault," he said firmly. "Not anyone's fault. Just...shitty luck, I guess."

Ryuji snorted, and raised his soda can in agreement. "Cheers to that," he muttered, and the mood noticeably lightened as Haru raised up her cup with a giggle, fast enough that the water inside it sloshed a little over the rim, and she just laughed harder at the puddle that was quickly soaked up by the dirt in front of her.

A glance sideways showed that heavy darkness had receded from the forefront of Akira's eyes, too, a faint smile curving into something soft on his face, lit by the flickering fire light, and Yusuke was briefly incredible thankful for the bizarre skill Ryuji had to bring the mood back up out of a slump whenever he _really_ tried hard.

The rest of the night passed in a much happier mood, only winding down to an end once they ran out of wood to keep the fire going and none of them particularly wanted to get up to hunt more down in the dark wilderness of trees that surrounded them - looking much more menacing as only vague shapes appearing as shadowing silhouettes backlit by the moon.

A vague itch to capture this moment - the group of them, content and lazy, curled around the dying embers of a fire and each other, Akira pressed quietly but comfortably up against him, back to back - started in his fingers, and one hand reached out to tap at the pocket where he always kept at least a single piece of paper. He'd lost his pen somewhere throughout the night, though, or maybe even during the drive when he'd fallen asleep, so he simply drummed his fingers on his thigh and waited for the urge - the inspiration - to pass. It always did, eventually, and besides - it was late enough that he _was_ tired. If he waited it out, his desire for sleep would outweigh his desire to sketch... _probably_.

Since Akira was leaning against him as he was, it wasn't surprising to Yusuke that he picked up on the twitchy movement of his hands drumming a fast paced beat on his leg. It was, however, a bit of a surprise that Akira could pick up on exactly what the problem he was facing was with just a brief, second long glance.

He rolled away from Yusuke, leaning closer towards the struggling coals that were their once-fire, and Yusuke had only a second to register the lack of Akira's warmth and weight and mourn their loss before Akira was back - holding a chunk of cooled charcoal from the edge of the fire pit in his hand, offering it to Yusuke with a faint look of triumph showing in his eyes.

"Ah." Yusuke blinked, and reached out automatically to take the charcoal. "Thank you, Akira," he said, and gave him a sweet smile.

It was hard to tell under the faint slivers of moonlight that managed to slip their way through the canopy above them, but Yusuke was almost certain that Akira was blushing.

"You're welcome," Akira said, looking up at the sky as he cleared his throat, and shifted his position so that Yusuke had more move to manoeuvre his arms without having to worry about elbowing Akira - something that had unfortunately happened a lot in his art classes before his classmates had learnt to give him a fairly wide bubble of personal space when he was 'in the zone.' "I saw the way you were looking at the moon," he went on. "And then you started the finger tapping thing. We all know what it means when you start the finger tapping thing."

Yusuke blinked. "I...hadn't noticed," he said, honestly. "I'd no idea I had such a tic."

Akira shrugged, watching Yusuke begin to streak lines of charcoal along the paper with curiosity. "You tap your fingers, Futaba chews her hair, Ann tugs on her ponytails, Ryuji rubs the back of his head, and Makoto avoids eye contact." He frowned. "I haven't figured out Haru's tell just yet, but I'm sure she has one."

Yusuke raised a brow at him. "And what's yours?"

"Huh?" Akira blinked at him, eyes wide behind his glasses.

"Your tell," he clarified. "Surely you have one, too."

"A tell?" He repeated. "I - I'm not actually sure I know," he said, bashfully. "If I did know my own tell, I'd do whatever I could to stop doing it." Akira tilted his head, and grinned at Yusuke. "So you tell me - what do you think my tell is?"

Yusuke paused in the action of shading the hollow of one particularly tall tree behind Akira, and placed down the charcoal and paper as he stared at him, considering.

It was a harder task - a more difficult question to answer - than Yusuke would have liked to admit, and from the smug, somewhat cocky smile forming wider and wider on Akira's face, he could tell this. But Yusuke wasn't going to give up easily, even if that meant sitting here and thinking on it until the sun was coming back up over the horizon.

He wasn't entirely sure of how much time had passed with him lost in thought when the answer finally hit him, like a blast of fire that Goemon couldn't withstand and he couldn't dodge, with pain and sorrow and the fear of letting the people he cared about all wrapped up in one - but it couldn't have been too long, for all that it felt like an eternity, because the fire was still clinging to some faint vestiges of life.

He looked up, and met Akira's curious, questioning gaze. Looked up, and finally thought about Christmas Eve, when he'd been doing his best to push the memory out of his mind until Akira himself brought it up.

It had been cold, that night - cold because of the winter chill, cold because of the poor insulation of Akira's attic room...and beyond that, cold for something far more intangible. There was a distance pressed between them as physical and real as the couch beneath them that they were both sat on, Akira fidgeting not even an inch from Yusuke and avoiding his gaze. Yusuke couldn't help but wonder, a bit lost, what exactly had happened since they had felled Yaldabaoth.

"Akira," he said, and hesitantly reached out to place a hand gently on his knee. "Are you okay? You seem..." He faltered. "...distracted."

Akira smiled wanly, and Yusuke could sense the lie unfurling from between his lips before he'd even spoken so much as a single word.

"I'm fine," Akira said, when he clearly wasn't - pale and drawn, he was a quiet tragedy of dark ink soaked onto snow bright paper, one Yusuke would have wanted to capture on canvas had he not cared for him so deeply.

"Don't lie to me," he said, and his grip on Akira's leg tightened instinctively. Eyes wide, Akira looked back at him unblinking - expression frighteningly blank, but radiating confusing and shock. "I see right through every crack in your mask, Akira."

The false smile on Akira's face faltered, wavered, and then broke. "You do have an artist's eye, I suppose," he muttered, sighing and looking away. Yusuke leant forward, to try and preserve eye contact, but Akira was having none of it.

"Sit back," he said. "I'll...I'll explain everything."

And he did - everything that Sae Nijima had told him, every bit of legal jargon and idiocy that he'd tried to argue against to no avail.

 _I'm going to jail_ , Akira had told him bluntly. And as much as his mind - his very soul and being - rebelled against the idea, Yusuke knew there was nothing he could do about, except offer what comfort he could to Akira in his last moments of freedom.

Because Akira was shaking, he saw, even more so than Yusuke himself was. There was a fear in his eyes that Yusuke had never seen before, and he found himself wondering just how much of 'Joker' had been sheer bravado before he moved, slowly and gently, to embrace Akira.

At first, he was stiff in Yusuke's arms, and he forced himself not to think on how long it must have been since the boy in his arms was hugged. Too long, no doubt.

But eventually, Akira relaxed, arms coming up hesitantly to return the hug and a hitch in his breath as he buried his face in Yusuke's shoulder and just _cried_.

"I don't want to do this," he whispered, and Yusuke closed his eyes. "But I _have_ to." His voice was choked up, and Yusuke breathed in shakily.

"It won't be forever," he said. It was all he could offer; a cold, empty comfort - but Akira didn't want false words or reassurances that he didn't _have_ to do it at all, not when it wasn't true, not when it would just make him feel even worse.

"But it will be long enough that it feels like it," Akira said. "I'll miss you."

Yusuke took in a deep breath. "I'll miss you too," he said quietly. "Life will be lonely without you, and much quieter.

For a moment, there was only that in the room - quiet. And then, with a shaky inhale, Akira pushed back from their embrace. "Will you wait for me?" He had asked, face and voice serious, unflinching, as he had locked gazes with Yusuke. There had been extra weight, unspoken meaning to those words, and Yusuke had swallowed back tears of his own as he answered Akira's confession in the only way he could -

\- with one of his own.

"Always," Yusuke promised, and smiled, hoping that Akira couldn't see just how much his heart was left bleeding inside.

Back in the present, the memory felt as vivid as it ever had, and Yusuke's heart _hurt_ as he realised the answer.

"You smile," he said softly, voice barely above a whisper. "When you smile - that's your tell."

Akira wasn't smiling anymore. He looked down and away from Yusuke, and let out a laugh that was as hollow and devoid of humour as the night had suddenly become. "Maybe you're right," he said, and Yusuke all but lunged forward, reaching for Akira's hand through the sudden fear that had stabbed through him - _if he leaves now, I might not get him to come back_.

"I didn't - I didn't mean it quite like it came out," he said. "It's not always. Most of the time, your smile is just that - a smile, and one of the most beautiful ones in the world." Akira blushed, and spluttered, and opened his mouth as if he was about to protest, but Yusuke kept going, his own words barrelling right over whatever it was Akira was trying to say. "But when you lie...your smile gives you away." He reached up with one hand to lightly trace the skin beneath Akira's eyes with his fingers. The frames were cool to the touch when he bumped against them, which just made the flaming heat of Akira's cheeks that much more obvious. "Normally, you smile with all of you. Your eyes, your entire face - they light up. But when you lie...it's hollow. It's just you moving the muscles of your face, just your lips curling up. There's no truth to it at all."

The laugh Akira let out then was startled, as if he wasn't sure how else to react to Yusuke's words. "Wow," he said softly. "You really do have me all figured out, huh?"

Yusuke shrugged, and leant back a little, letting his hand fall away from Akira's face. "I do have an artist's eye," he reminded Akira, and the smile - small, soft and _real_ \- the flashed into existence on his face at that moment had him hopeful that maybe, in the end, everything would work out fine.

"Speaking of," Akira said, and reached down to the ground where Yusuke had dropped his paper and charcoal, "how about you finish this now, before Makoto gets any antsier about how late it's getting and herds us all to bed?"

Yusuke laughed, and took the half-finished sketch Akira offered out to him.

"What are you drawing, anyway?" Akira asked.

"The sky," Yusuke said after a minute of consideration. "And the trees. The shadows and the moonlight - it creates a more interesting array of shapes and contrast to work with in black and white than daylight does."

Akira's slow blinks told Yusuke that he'd understood approximately none of that - he had become intimately familiar with the look back when he'd been dragging Akira into Mementos and around Tokyo in order to find inspiration - but he still looked genuinely interested in the art itself, at least, and happy besides.

"Mmm," he hummed his agreement. "The sky does look nice right now, doesn't it?" He said. "Reminds me almost of Shinokawa - that's one thing I've missed in Tokyo." He sighed a little, looking up and said sky, thankfully not noticing how Yusuke had startled at the mention of the hometown he'd rarely - if ever - brought up in conversation.

"What is it you've missed?" Yusuke asked, and Akira's voice was wistful as he answered, still looking up at that vast stretch of midnight sky.

"The stars," he said. "Tokyo is too lit up and full of smog to really see them well. But here?" He sighed. "Look, Yusuke - look at how clear the sky is. Isn't it just beautiful?"

"Yes," Yusuke said immediately, looking up at that clear sky full of stars - and then down at Akira, every line of his body relaxed as he smiled softly and bathed in the faint moonlight. "Gorgeous."

**|now|**

"God, it's so gorgeous out here!" Ann's eyes were wide, her voice excited as she lunged forward out of the van to tackle hug both Shiho and Akira together before the vehicle had even fully stopped moving.

Shiho laughed, and Akira rolled his eyes. "Ah, yes," he said. "The beauty of empty fields and dirt backroads."

Ann elbowed him. "You _know_ what I mean," she said, laughing as she finally let him go. "There's so many houses here...so many gardens!"

From where she was still sitting in the van, Haru cheered her agreement.

"You were here not even a month ago, Ann," Shiho reminded her, a giggle audible in her voice as she grinned, her entire face lit up brighter than Akira had seen it since the last time he'd seen Ann in person, when they'd dropped him off on his doorstep and Shiho had been waiting there with his parents to greet him.

"I was too upset then to really pay attention." Ann waved off her words easily. "We were leaving you and Akira behind! But this time, we're taking you with us, and we're going to a _private beach!_ " Ann was practically bouncing in excitement, and all of them were too happy to see her and Shiho so active and lit up that they let them run off to the van without complaining about them helping get their luggage in the back.

Haru giggled as Ryuji rolled his eyes and stepped forward to give Akira a hug that, short as it was, he all but clung to, and scoop up the two bags of stuff Shiho had brought on the bus from her own house. "Where's yours, Akira?" He asked.

"Upstairs," Akira said. "With Morgana."

Ryuji nodded, and grinned. "Need any help getting it down?" He asked, and Akira opened his mouth to say that his dad would help him - but before he could speak, Ryuji answered his own question with a wicked grin even wider than the one before it, and a call for Yusuke. "Oi, Inari!" He yelled out. "Your boyfriend needs a hand!"

Akira sputtered, and flailed a bit internally, especially as Yusuke slid out of the van with no reaction to Ryuji's words except a slightly raised brow and a faint smile on his face. Akira envied him his poise, and felt a small amount of resentment that, for all he'd been able to run circles around most people for almost a full year, his friends just knew him so well that they knew how to press all the right buttons to shut down whatever part of him had ever been anything even close to 'cool.'

He aimed a half-hearted kick at Ryuji's shins as his friend turned back to carry Shiho's luggage to the van - missing, of course, which Ryuji just laughed over - as Yusuke sidled up next to him, and offered him merely a smile in greeting.

Well, Akira wasn't having that - if Ann had tried her best to tackle him bodily to the ground and even Ryuji had thrown his arms around him, he was damn sure getting a hug from Yusuke.

And so, he did exactly that - moving hesitantly at first, giving Yusuke a bit of forewarning and the opportunity to back away if he really didn't actually want a hug; thankfully, Yusuke seemed to get what it was he was doing, what he wanted, and met him halfway.

The hug was short - barely longer than Ryuji's had been - but it was long enough to suffuse Akira with a warmth that had absolutely nothing to do with the unseasonably hot spring weather.

Well, mostly not the weather. He was almost certain that the hug had been so short simply _because_ of how hot it was.

"Lead on," Yusuke said, and gestured towards the still open front door.

"Come on in." Akira pushed the door open wider, and sighed as the comparatively cooler air of the house hit him, after standing so long beneath sweltering sun. "Don't bother to take your shoes off." If they were staying longer than just a quick luggage run, he would have let Yusuke in in only his socks, but as it was it was more effort than it was worth to try and put them back on after only five minutes or so of them off, and his mother rarely cared anyway - she'd grown up in England, and wasn't as caring as his father was about some cultural traditions.

Pausing partway to bending down to unite his laces, Yusuke nodded, and straightened up just as Akira's father rounded the corner that led into the entrance hall.

"Dad," Akira said, and if he wasn't just imagining things, it almost seemed as if Yusuke stood even stiffer. "This is Yusuke." He gestured to the boy in question.

Hideki Kurusu, for all that he was an incredibly strict lawyer, was also quite possibly the most laid back man Akira had ever known - and his only reaction to Yusuke's faint 'deer in headlights' expression was a faint quirk of his lips.

His eyes shot to Akira's, just briefly, and there was an amused question there that had Akira on the edge of blushing, and thankful that it was hot enough that any red on his cheeks or neck could be explained away.

Apparently that was answer enough, because after nodding to Yusuke in greeting and reminding Akira that he was to come say farewell to his parents before 'just gallivanting off,' Akira's father turned back the way he came, chuckling to himself.

"My bedroom is the first room by the staircase," he said, before Yusuke could ask anything - like _why is your dad laughing like that?_ "We should hurry; knowing Makoto she's got our itinerary planned out perfectly and if we diverge from it at all she'll leave without us."

"I wouldn't say she'd go quite _that_ far," Yusuke mused. "She might just tie us to the roof of the van as punishment."

Akira made a face. "Ugh, bugs."

"Haru's right, you know," Yusuke said, jumping up the last two stairs in one step. "I'll never understand how you could do gardening with her, considering your aversion to insects." He tilted his head as if thinking as he pushed open the door to Akira's bedroom. "Or how you managed to bear having insect shaped Personas."

"Great strength of will," Akira said. "And for all Haru likes to tease me about bugs and gardening, there were absolutely no bugs on her plants. They wouldn't dare touch them for fear of Haru's wrath."

"Fair," Yusuke said, and nodded to Morgana as they stepped into the room.

Akira grinned as Morgana perked up, and jumped down from his perch atop Akira's bag to come over to them. He wound around Yusuke's legs in greeting, and the look on his face was priceless. Morgana had started doing that recently - and Akira wasn't sure yet if it was because Morgana was trying to perfect the normal cat routine around his parents, if his acceptance of the fact that he was a cat (even if he hadn't quite given up on becoming human yet) was changing his behaviour, or if he was just trying to mess with Akira - and now the rest of the gang, too.

All three options were plausible, and for all Akira knew it was a little bit from all of them.

"Hello, Morgana," Yusuke said once he'd recovered from his stupor. "How have you been?"

"Bored," Morgana said. "And hungry! Akira's mum read somewhere that human food is bad for cats so now she won't let Akira or his dad feed me anything but that awful tinned stuff."

"It is for cats," Akira pointed out.

"I'm not a normal cat!" Morgana scowled at him. "I was eating the same food as you for a whole year in Tokyo, and I'm fine!"

Akira shrugged. He knew it wasn't anywhere near as bad as Morgana was trying to make it sound - he was sneaking his friend snacks all the time, and he'd caught his dad more than once looking supremely guilty with Morgana looking supremely smug; his dad always did have a soft spot for fluffy things (especially cats) so it made an amusing sort of sense to Akira that he was going out of his way to sneak Morgana treats without his wife seeing it. Most likely, what Morgana was trying to do here was garner sympathy from Yusuke and the rest once he saw them, in the hopes of more treats or pets.

Morgana was a bit of a glutton like that, Akira had come to realise.

"I think it would be for the best if we got going, now," Yusuke said, amusement bleeding through in his tone. By himself, he picked up the larger of the two bags piled on Akira's bed and threw the other one to Akira. "Go say goodbye to your parents; I'll get this put away in the van."

Akira nodded, and let Yusuke pass him first to go down the stairs, since he was carrying the heavier back. Daintily, Morgana followed, prancing right on Yusuke's heels.

At the bottom of the staircase, they split off - Yusuke back outside to the car, and Akira deeper into the house, to where the kitchen was. Lately, his mother had taken to laying on the cold tiles of the kitchen floor when the ache in her hip was dull enough to let her get down there in the first place.

His father looked up from where he was reading a newspaper to nod at him when he entered the room, and Akira stepped forward to claim a quick hug from him.

"Be good while you're gone," he said. "Be careful with those girls, okay?" Mischief sparkled in his eyes. "Or maybe I should say with _that boy_."

Akira flushed, and shoved his dad away. "Nope," he said. "We're not having this conversation. It's cancelled, changing channels _now_."

He laughed. "Sure thing, kid," he said, and Akira pouted inside at the thought that his parents got far too much amusement from his suffering. "Being serious, though - have fun, but be careful. Stay safe. And make sure to call your mother a few times a day, lest her anxiety get the best of her."

Akira nodded, almost solemn. "Of course," he said. "Regular check-ins were part of the deal to let me go; I haven't forgotten."

"That's my boy," his father said, and turned his attention back to his newspaper after reaching out to mess up Akira's already far too messy hair.

He scowled as he batted the hand away, and turned away from the dining table where his dad sat to enter the kitchen proper; where his mother lay, symmetrical to the cupboards that ran along the length of the bench the sink was set in.

"Hey, mum," he said, and she blinked open half-lidded eyes to stare blankly at him for a moment.

"Oh, Akira," she said, and yawned, struggling to push herself up from the ground. Akira was swift to move to her side and aid her - her skin nearly shone with sweat and her eyes looked scarily sunken in, the skin around them almost bruised. She was always like this in extreme weather - in heat, she wilted; in the cold, she was nearly comatose. "Sweetheart, are you going already?"

Akira nodded. "Yeah, my friends are waiting for me out front," he said, and she offered him a weak smile as one of her hands absentmindedly pat his cheek.

"You'll be good, won't you?"

"Of course," he promised. "I'll even bring you a souvenir."

"I want something that looks made for tourists," she said. "Something a foreigner would take home as a gift."

Akira rolled his eyes. "Don't we have enough tasteless decor cluttering the house?" He asked, and she gasped in mock horror.

"Akira," she said, seriously. "Son. There is no such thing as 'enough tasteless decor.' If I haven't managed to teach you this, then I've failed as both a mother and a human being."

Akira snorted. "I think dad disagrees with you," he said.

"Well, your father always has had particularly bad taste," she said. "He's lucky I started pursuing him first, else he might have ended up forever alone."

Akira laughed, and leant forward to hug his mother. She was small in his arms, smaller even then she had been before he left for Tokyo, and it wasn't like she'd been the healthiest size back then, either. A stab of worry filled him, and he tightened his embrace. "I'll miss you," he said, and her arms came up to wrap around him tight, too.

"Never as much as I'll miss you," she promised. "Please don't get into any trouble, Akira. I want to see you home in one piece in a few days."

"And I promise you, you will." He pulled back from the hug, and offered her one last wide smile. "See you next week, mum."

She pressed a kiss to his forehead, and he briefly closed his eyes. "See you next week, sweetheart."

As Akira made his way to the front door, he paused briefly in the entrance - and definitely _not_ to take a second to wipe away any tears that might have formed. He didn't want to admit it, but he still felt a slight stab of fear...the last time he'd left this house for more than just a daytrip, it had been by order of the courts and a police escort to the train station.

It was different this time, he reminded himself. No cops, no criminal record, no probation banning him from coming back home to his parents if he really wanted to. Just his friends - the people he loved most in the world - all piled into a van, ready to catch a ferry to take them to a private stretch of beach.

This parting was nothing but happiness, and it wasn't an indefinite 'forever.' He'd be back within the week, and then it would be back to panicking over getting ready for school and wishing he could have just continued his education in Shujin. His mother had wanted him home, though, once his name had been cleared, and Akira couldn't blame her - as much as he was homesick for Tokyo now, he'd spent a year in Tokyo homesick for Shinokawa. He knew how she felt.

He wiped his mind of those worries, though, as he stepped outside and ran to the still open door of the van to slip into the seat that had been his on the drive to Shinokawa, too. The only real difference was that Haru now sat in the front, and Futaba next to him where Ryuji had sat - now, Ryuji was piled into the very back with Shiho and Ann. Makoto was still driving, because apparently she didn't trust any of the rest of them behind the wheel, not even Haru - and Yusuke was still sitting next to him, too, which he was grateful for, even as there was a part of him that wished that no one was sitting anywhere near him because of how damn hot it was.

"Hey, Akira-kun," Haru waved hello with a soft smile. "How have you been?"

"Good," Akira said, sending Haru a smile of his own. "I've been good. Settling into things back home, missing you guys."

"He's been spending a lot of time with me," Shiho piped up from the back as Haru blushed a little.

"Which I have been blessed for," Akira nodded to her.

"Shiho _is_ a blessing," Ann agreed, and while Shiho did a better job at not outright just _blushing_ at a few embarrassing words directed her way, there was no mistaking the way her ears turned red.

"This is cute and all, but now that we're all together I have some important things to say," Futaba said, and Akira startled at the tone of her voice - deep and stern. "Makoto, start driving."

Makoto raised her brows - Akira could see the movement in the rear view mirror as she looked back - but complied without a word of complaint.

"Futaba," Akira said. "What is it?"

"First, I want everyone to take the battery out of their phone," she said. "I've swept the van for bugs but I can't make that guarantee for our cells, just like I can't guarantee that just shutting it down will be good enough." She bit her lip. "I can't say anymore until you've done that."

Akira reached for the pocket of his shorts and tugged out his phone immediately, sliding off the back of his phone and pulling out the battery piece. Next to him, he noticed Yusuke doing the same thing.

"Haru, my phone is in my pocket," Makoto said. "Could you take care of it for me?"

"Of course, Mako-chan," Haru said, placing the pieces of her own dismantled phone down on the dash.

A minute later, and they were all done.

"Okay," Futaba said, taking in a deep breath. "Okay."

And then she told them everything.

Yusuke, Akira noticed, once Futaba was done, didn't seem very surprised at all.

"You already knew this?" He asked, and shamefaced, Yusuke nodded.

"I'm sorry, but I couldn't tell you," he said.

Akira waved him off. "No, I understand why," he said, and sighed. "This is...big."

In the back, Ryuji snorted. "Yeah, no kidding," he said. "Maybe a bit _too_ big."

Looking back, Shiho seemed a little frightened, clutching Ann's arm to her. "You guys really don't do things by halves, do you?" She asked, and Ryuji laughed, nudging her in the side.

"You know, you're one of us now," he said. "Phantom Thief Suzui."

She laughed, the air in the van becoming considerably lighter.

"This is just like any other...heist," Makoto said evenly. "We'll prepare for it the best we can, reconnoitre, and weather the storm. Even without access to our personas or the Metaverse, we're together, and we're forewarned, thanks to Futaba."

"Forearmed," Akira agreed.

There was another moment of silence, as they all reassembled their phones back into a single piece once more, and then after that, Akira looked up to lock eyes with Yusuke.

"I'm sorry for not telling you," he said. "Not even just over the phone - I was tempted to, in your room."

Akira shook his head, and reached out to place a hand on Yusuke's arm. "Like I said, I understand why you didn't."

The drive after that was quiet, contemplative, with everyone apparently too tense to talk with the knowledge that their phones might be completely tapped, deep enough that not even Futaba felt it was safe to talk, with all the security and precautions she'd programmed into their tech. Arriving at the port and getting on the ferry - where vehicles were stowed beneath deck and they were forced to hang around on top - was almost a relief, just to escape the web of silence it felt unsafe to break.

Apparently Makoto felt the same way, because the moment they were on the water and allowed to wander around, she made a beeline for the small cafe on the boat in order to buy herself a can of coffee, the lines of stress around her eyes extremely visible and making her look even more like her sister than usual. Haru and Futaba went with her - Haru looking concerned, and Futaba slightly guilty. He wanted to call out to her, to explain that this wasn't her fault and no one blamed her, but she was already out of earshot by the time he'd realised she was going.

Ann was babbling about something she'd seen in a documentary - dolphins riding in the wake stirred up by boats, or something, and she was tugging Shiho over to the railing as Ryuji trailed behind them, looking extremely amused.

And in the end, all that was left was Akira and Yusuke - Morgana, though unimpressed about it, had acquiesced gracefully into being placed into one of the animal cages kept below deck, so that they wouldn't get in trouble for trying to keep him in the van.

With his phone back together and on, now, Akira didn't want to risk talking about what he'd just found out, but nor did he want to go to the effort of dismantling his phone once more.

So, instead, he held out his hand to Yusuke, and smiled when he blinked, as if in confusion.

"Come on," he said. "It's a nice day out, and the sea breeze is cool. Let's just...relax together. At least until we're at Yakushima."

Yusuke smiled, bright and not just with his mouth - his eyes lit up, reflecting sky blue. "I'd love that," he said, honestly.

The found a quiet spot on the - well, Akira wasn't really sure what the side of the boat was called. Starboard? Port? It didn't really matter, he supposed - but it was by the cabin, where the sun overhead cast a shadow in just the right place for the two of them to sit together.

Akira sighed as he leant back, laying his head down against Yusuke's shoulder and reaching down to link their fingers together.

Yusuke jumped as if startled, before settling and squeezing Akira's hand. "Are you..." He hesitated. "Are you ready to talk now, then?"

Akira blinked. He hadn't even realised that Yusuke had noticed that he'd been avoiding the topic, a bit. He shifted uncomfortably, and after several false starts said, "I mean...if you are?" He winced at how it came out sounding like a question.

"I am," Yusuke said firmly. "But if you're not, then I don't want to push you."

"You're not," Akira reassured him. "It's just that - I didn't want you to feel...obligated, I guess?" He looked at Yusuke's face, attempting to gauge his reaction, but his expression was stoic, unreadable. "A year...it's a long time to be apart, Yusuke."

"But it's a year away from _you_ , Akira, and that's what makes all the difference in the world," he said softly. "I didn't say it in so many words before, but I think you need to hear it now - I love you, Akira Kurusu."

Akira's breath hitched, catching in his throat, and for a minute the world and everything in it just _froze_. "...You don't mean that," he forced out eventually, but Yusuke frowned at him until he felt like shrinking into nothingness.

"I _do_ ," he pressed. "I mean it more than I've ever meant anything else in my life. I love you, and I'm going to wait for you, whether that means waiting for a year or even longer. Whenever you're ready to have me, I'll be there. And until that moment, I will just continue to love you."

Akira almost wanted to laugh. Only Yusuke could come off as so romantic while sounding so offended. "You might be waiting a while," he said weakly, and Yusuke shook his head.

"Like I told you," he said. "I'm fine with that."

"And if I said I wanted to kiss you right now?" Akira challenged. "Would you be fine with that?"

Yusuke met his gaze, unblinking, unflinching, no hesitation. "As long as you really meant it," he said.

And so, Akira took his words at face value, and dove forward before his flash of bravado had a chance to truly leave him. He heard Yusuke make a startled, muffled sound -

And then he wasn't hearing anything anymore, because he was _kissing Yusuke_.

It was chaste kiss, soft and hesitant, two people unsure of the others reaction wondering just how to move forward - but it was warm, and it was Yusuke, so Akira closed his eyes and sunk into it, recording that brief moment of time into his mind eternally.

When he pulled back, Yusuke's cheeks were as flushed as his no doubt were. An achievement, he thought dazedly.

Yusuke cleared his throat. "So...what did that mean, exactly?" He asked, looking slightly lost.

Akira curled further into his side, nuzzling his face into Yusuke's shoulder. "It means I want to try," he said quietly. "Even if we have to put it on hold again once the weekend is over. Even if it turns out that we _don't_ work out - I want to try."

"Even if now isn't exactly the best timing?"

"Especially because of that." He took in a breath, deep and shaky. "Maybe...I'm a little tired of the idea of waiting for the 'right moment' because of how many times I've had to ground knocked right out from under my feet. I think it's worth risking it, Yusuke." Akira met his eyes with his own. Yusuke had said that when he was truly happy, his eyes showed it - so when he said his next words, he let those eyes help with the speaking.

"Because I love you, too," he said.

Yusuke smiled, the sea breeze playing gently with the strands of hair that had fallen into his face. "I know," he said. "As I love you."

Akira smiled, and looked down at their linked hands - and then up, across the horizon, to sea an expanse of nothing but endless blue sea and sky.

Somewhere out there was their destination, he knew - possibility filled with danger and enemies on all sides. Once they were ashore, this perfect moment, this peace filled, shining bubble, would be broken. He _knew_ this.

But in that moment, they were together -

\- and whatever was coming, they'd be together to face it.

(It was a promise.)


End file.
